Tibetan Democracy: Governance, Leadership and Conflict in Exile 9781350989450, 9781786730466

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Trine Brox is Associate Professor at the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen. A specialist on Tibet, she is co-editor with Ildiko´ Belle´r-Hann of On the Fringes of the Harmonious Society: Tibetans and Uyghurs in Socialist China (2014).

‘Trine Brox plunges us into the transformations, translations, paradoxes and contradictions of democracy as a sacred gift decreed from above by the Dalai Lama, now rapidly maturing into distinctively Tibetan forms. The tensions between democracy as an inborn right, democracy as modernity, democracy as legitimacy, democracy as a support for or a threat to national unity, are fully explored, bringing to us many Tibetan subjectivities. How exiled Tibetans make sense and make use of this gift, making it fully theirs and no longer that of the giver, is what makes this book a sensitive insight into the paths taken and not taken.’ Gabriel Lafitte, author of Spoiling Tibet: China and Resource Nationalism on the Roof of the World ‘Trine Brox’s long-term research work highlights the democratic processes in the Tibetan exile community in India . . . the words of the numerous interviewees provide the reader with a lively and very personal perspective on the exile-Tibetan democratisation process.’ Stephanie Roemer, author of The Tibetan Government-in-Exile

TIBETAN DEMOCRACY

Governance, Leadership and Conflict in Exile

TRINE BROX

To Tinde

Published in 2016 by I.B.Tauris & Co. Ltd London • New York www.ibtauris.com Copyright q 2016 Trine Brox The right of Trine Brox to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or any part thereof, may not be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Every attempt has been made to gain permission for the use of the images in this book. Any omissions will be rectified in future editions. References to websites were correct at the time of writing. Library of South Asian History and Culture 11 ISBN: 978 1 78453 601 5 eISBN: 978 1 78672 046 7 ePDF: 978 1 78673 046 6 A full CIP record for this book is available from the British Library A full CIP record is available from the Library of Congress Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: available Typeset in Garamond Three by OKS Prepress Services, Chennai, India Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

CONTENTS

Map: Tibetan settlements in India List of Illustrations Preface Note on Language Abbreviations Introduction Tibetan Exile, Democracy and Translation 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

The Dalai Lama and Authoritative Speech The Model Settlement Dharamsala Democrats and Organisations A Place for Buddhism in Democracy? ‘I Don’t Like Politics, But I Love My Country’ Freedom Struggle over Democracy

vi vii ix xiv xv 1 60 104 141 181 215 254

Postscript

285

Notes Bibliography Index

299 356 377

Jammu & Kashmir

Punjab

PAKISTAN

TIBET AUTONOMOUS Uttarakhand REGION

Himachal Pradesh

Haryana

Uttar Pradesh

Rajasthan

INDIA

Gujrat

Goa Karnataka

Jarkhand

Chattisgarh Orissa

Manipur West Tripura Mizoram Bangal

MYANMAR (BURMA)

Andhra Pradesh

Tamilnadu Kerala

Arabian Sea

Assam Nagaland

Bihar

Madhya Pradesh

Maharashtra

Arunachal Pradesh

NEPAL

Sri Lanka

Bay of Bengal

Dharamsala Mussoorie Dekyiling Rajpur Clement Town Majnu Ka Tilla Delhi Bangalore Bylakuppe

Tibetan settlements in India. Many Tibetan exiles are living in South Asian settlements under the jurisdiction of the Central Tibetan Administration. There are 39 settlements located in India, four of which are treated in this book: the exile-Tibetan political headquarters in Dharamsala and Dekyiling settlement in North India, and the twin settlements of Lugsam and Dickey Larsoe in Bylakuppe, South India.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

All photographs were taken by Trine Brox.

Figures Figure 2.1 Protected area warning outside Sera Jey Monastery

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Figure 2.2 Organisational structure of a settlement

127

Figure 3.1 Demonstration in Dharamsala, October 2006

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Figure 4.1 Sera Jey Monastery in Bylakuppe

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Figure 5.1 Members of parliament having a tea-break outside the parliament-in-exile’s headquarters 224 Figure 6.1 Outside the community hall in Village 11

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Figure P.1 Democratisation in East Europe and Dharamsala. Reprinted from Tibetan Review, courtesy of editor Pema Thinley

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Tables Table 1.1 The changing meaning of ‘democracy’ and the contexts it appears in

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Table 5.1 Voters according to affiliation at the 2011 elections

220

Table 5.2 Voter turnout in selected settlements 2011

222

PREFACE

This is a book about democracy and democratisation among Tibetan exiles living in India. It questions democracy as a predefined and universally applicable concept, and enhances the understanding of democracy as a constructed concept by showing how democracy cannot move in time and space without translation. For Tibetan exiles, democracy has assumed the status of a gift from the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. I refer to democracy here as an enchanted gift, which is to say that democracy has been translated by its recipients as a gift imbued with the divinity of the donor. In this manner, although this book is empirically embedded amongst Tibetans in India, it also addresses issues of theoretical significance for translation studies, democracy and democratisation studies, exile and modernity studies, as well as anthropological studies on gift exchange. It is not an anthropological work, yet I rely on ethnographic data. The arguments and conclusions presented in this book are based on multi-sited field research during 2005–7 and 2012.1 I stayed and worked at various sites in North and South India, where I sought to hear voices speaking from varying geographical proximities to the politically tense and controlled environment of the exile-Tibetan headquarters in Dharamsala where democracy has been planned and decided upon. I conducted fieldwork in and around Dharamsala (Himachal Pradesh), Dekyiling (Uttarakhand), and the settlements Lugsam and Dickey Larsoe (Karnataka). Additionally, I conducted

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interviews in the settlement areas of Clement Town, Tseringdhonden, and the Tibetan Women’s Handicraft Center in Rajpur (Uttarakhand), and among Tibetans living in Indian communities situated in Mussoorie and Rajpur (Uttarakhand), Bangalore (Karnataka), Majnu Ka Tilla Tibetan Colony and the suburbs of Delhi. I completed 191 in-depth interviews, 57 of which were conducted in Tibetan language. Tibetans from a wide range of occupations, status, ages and life situations were interviewed. Among the interviewees, 54 were women and 145 were men, including 14 emigrants, 11 monks, five nuns, 23 leaders in organisations at the headquarters, 25 leaders in local organisations, eight home-district representatives, 19 community leaders, five administrators, 17 students, 34 civil servants, ten political representatives, 23 farmers or labourers, and 16 retired soldiers, among others. In total 119 interviews were recorded, amounting to 114 hours and 30 minutes of recordings. I always introduced myself as a researcher, doing a research project on exile-Tibetan communities, and I sought individual consent where possible. In a few cases, my informants had apparently been told to talk to me. For instance, it had puzzled me that when I approached potential interlocutors in Dickey Larsoe, they were already expecting me. I was told by one interlocutor that the settlement administration had received a letter from the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) saying that everybody in the villages of Dickey Larsoe had to help the researchers arriving from Dharamsala. The settlement administration, so the story went, passed on that message to the leaders of 16 villages, asking them to convey the message to all inhabitants that they should help the researchers in every possible way they could. The order was to ‘serve them well’. I believe that there had been a misunderstanding. The letter that the settlement administration had received from the CTA probably referred to a survey group coming from the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Dharamsala. Some of the village leaders mistakenly thought we were the researchers that the message referred to, since my assistant Kunchok Dolma always introduced us over the phone by saying we had come all the way from Dharamsala to talk to them. On one occasion, the village leader of one

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xi

village in Dickey Larsoe called for a meeting when we arrived. After we had announced our arrival on the phone to the leader, he came out of his house and started to blow a whistle, calling the villagers to come out of their houses. Soon people started to walk up to the run-down community hall. There were mostly people in their sixties and seventies, but a young mother also came with a baby on her arm. They proceeded to squat down around me and Kunchok Dolma, with the village leader occupying the only chair. After my introduction, each of them told us their names, their age and when they had left Tibet. I asked questions and they talked, sometimes one by one, other times all at once. While I am sure that this misunderstanding assisted me in gaining access and feeling welcome in the villages of Dickey Larsoe since people opened their homes and shared in every way possible, there are of course ethical ramifications of having my informants ordered to assist the researchers, just as one might reflect on the kind of data derived from people feeling obliged or even pressured to give that data. This was, nonetheless, not the general circumstances of the interviews, and I believe that I have been able in most cases to maintain an element of voluntary individual consent. In compliance with ethical guidelines for fieldwork, I have used pseudonyms to protect the identity of my informants, except in the cases of public figures where I received permission to use their names. Twelve interviewees have asked to remain anonymous in this book. There were two main reasons for this: because they feared that their families in Tibet would face repercussions if Chinese authorities knew of their exile activities, or because they feared that their statements might lead to stigmatisation within the exile communities because they breached collective norms. Although only 12 people wanted anonymity, I have chosen to anonymise all interlocutors throughout the book, and I have noted ‘pseudonym’ after the names of the individuals concerned in the footnote references. The dynamic approach of field research, involving multi-layered and multi-sited fieldwork, was necessary due to the complex issues at hand. Through hearing these multiple voices, the life story of democracy was told and took shape as a cumulative rendering throughout the process of fieldwork. The subsequent analysis of my

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data revealed a depiction of democracy which was waved as a flag, spoken as a discourse, built as an institution, translated into a gift, negotiated as a practice, and became a source of tensions. I have discussed some of these issues previously: the historical development of the Dalai Lama’s discourse on democracy,2 the multiple Tibetan secularisms,3 the strategy that unyokes the political from the religious in the authority of the Dalai Lama,4 and how the Tibetan government-in-exile has constructed the Tibetan demos in its definition of Tibetan citizenship and political representation.5 Besides, this book began as a PhD thesis.6 I worked on the PhD thesis on a three-year scholarship from the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Copenhagen. Additionally, I received generous funding from Fonden Frikkes Legat, which made it possible for me to conduct preliminary fieldwork in 2005. Fieldwork conducted in 2006 – 7 was financed by Julie von Mu¨llens Fond, Fonden Frikkes Legat, and the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies at the University of Copenhagen. The Nordic Institute of Asian Studies in Copenhagen, as well as the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, provided me shelter when I wrote this book. I collaborated with Azmina Siddique, Thomas Stottor, Sara Magness and Tia Ali at I.B.Tauris in the final stages of the book project, and I would like to thank them for their support. Moreover, I am indebted to a great number of people who made my fieldwork experiences enriching and productive. The list is too long to mention everybody, yet here I will thank all the political exiles, freedom fighters, civil servants, intellectuals, politicians, sisters, brothers, injis and Kashmiris who so graciously offered their time on this project. I thank them for their hospitality, trust and friendship that they have given me – an inji and a pardesi. They were generous in opening their homes, telling their stories, sharing their viewpoints, and simply enjoying good times together with me. Thank you. Acknowledgements are also due to Lobsang Shastri at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, to Tenzin Norbu the very helpful legislative counsel at the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, Nyima Tsam

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who assisted me at a critically busy time in McLeod Ganj, as well as Solvej Hyveled Nielsen, Choephel Tsering, Sonam Yangsom and Wangdue. I must also highlight the joys and challenges shared with my friends Dolma Tsering, Tashi Topgyal, and especially my assistant Kunchok Dolma. They helped me in so many ways during my stays in India, including translating interviews, introducing me to informants and debating the topics of my book. I hope one day we will reunite in Tibet like we imagined. When I worked on my PhD dissertation in Copenhagen during 2005– 8, I received encouragement, inspiration and indispensable guidance from my supervisors Cynthia Gek Hua Chou and JanUlrich Sobisch. I feel particularly lucky to have gained the opportunity to work with both as colleagues at the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, and I look forward to our continued collaboration and friendship. Robbie Barnett, Jørgen Delman and Martijn van Beek, who constituted the assessment committee, offered constructive critique of my PhD dissertation, as well as valuable advice and encouragement in the later stages of my career, for which I am grateful. I also have to thank many friends and colleagues, all of them eminent experts in their respective fields who have helped me along the way, in particular Lars Buur, Frida Hastrup, Daniella Kuzmanovic, Katja Kvaale, Daria Morgounova Schwalbe, and Miriam Kogtvedgaard Zeitzen who have read and responded to different parts of the book. Thanks also to Denise Gimpel and Kirsten Thisted for discussing the concept of translation with me. Khenpo Konchok Rangdrol, Maria Bjerregaard, Anne Burchardi, and Carola Roloff helped me solve some Tibetan-language mysteries. I owe particular thanks to Elizabeth Williams Ørberg who agreed to do the language- and copy-editing of this book and contributed immensely to my discussion about modernity and secularism. I thank all of you for your generosity. Finally, I am happily and forever indebted to my husband Peter Bager for his support during every phase of research and writing, and I am especially grateful that he and our baby daughter Tinde joined me for fieldwork in 2012. I dedicate this book to Tinde.

NOTE ON LANGUAGE

All translations of quotations from Tibetan-language texts and interviews were done by the author. Tibetan words are italicised and transliterated according to the system described by Wylie (1959), for example chos and srid. Standard Tibetan terms and names, such as lama and Utsang, appear in transcribed form in the text.

ABBREVIATIONS

co-op: CTA: NDPT: RTWA: RTYC: TCHRD: TWA: TYC: YBMPs: YFBD:

cooperative society (sa gnas mnyam sbrel) Central Tibetan Administration (dbus bod mi’i sgrig ’dzugs) National Democratic Party of Tibet (bod kyi rgyal yongs mang gtso tshogs pa) Regional Tibetan Women’s Association Regional Tibetan Youth Congress Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (bod kyi ’gro ba mi’i thob thang dang mang gtso ’phel rgyas lte gnas khang) Tibetan Women’s Association (bod kyi bud med lhan tshogs) Tibetan Youth Congress (bod kyi gzhon nu lhan tshogs) Youth for Better MPs (nyi ma gsar pa’i bod kyi na gzhon ’khor lo) Youth for Better Democracy (mang gtso gong ’phel ched na gzhon dang blangs)

INTRODUCTION TIBETAN EXILE, DEMOCRACY AND TRANSLATION

Democracy, Tibetan exiles generally agree, was a gift from the foremost religious and political authority among Tibetans, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. Democracy was given to them by the Dalai Lama soon after he and 80,000 of his Tibetan followers in 1959 sought refuge in India from the Chinese oppression in Tibet. Already in the summer of 1960, Tibetan refugees held their first election to select delegates to a government-in-exile, which marked the first time that ordinary Tibetans were included into the ruling demos (‘people’) of the government that in Tibet only had consisted of the clergy and aristocracy who had run political affairs on behalf of the Tibetan people.1 Avedon has described this historic event in his book, In Exile from the Land of Snows, as such: from their temporary shelters in refugee camps and road camps, Tibetans nominated their candidates by writing a name on a slip of paper; lay people wrote the name of one candidate from their own region; and the clergy wrote the name of one candidate from their own religious tradition. Since this first batch of refugees were mainly Tibetans from eastern Tibet, and since they had written down the names of the renowned and respected from their communities, the 13 representatives who obtained the most votes in this first democratic and highly informal exercise in democracy were lamas,2 aristocrats and tribal chiefs from the eastern Tibetan provinces of Kham and Amdo.3 This group of

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selected Tibetan refugees thus constituted the first democratically elected Tibetan parliament-in-exile. One December evening in Dekyiling Tibetan settlement in India, almost 50 years later, I talked with 22-year-old Diki Choyang about what democracy and modernity meant to her.4 She was a Tibetan woman from a remote Tibetan community in north-east India. She had been schooled at the Tibetan Children’s Village (TCV) in Dharamsala and later obtained a BA in computer science from Panjab University. Diki Choyang’s thoughts on democracy expressed during our conversation mirror those of many Tibetan exiles. She placed election at the centre of her understanding of democracy and named the Dalai Lama as its architect. Diki Choyang related the story of the birth of democracy and explained that when the Dalai Lama – whom she deemed in her own words as ‘top level’ modern – stated that he had given Tibetans democracy, everybody paid heed and immediately put his words into action. Most Tibetan exiles seem to agree on this point and, for some, the only way to make democracy happen amongst Tibetans is by imposing it on people. Tibetans have, on numerous occasions, told me that if suggestions for changes come from below, then nobody will listen. Moreover, Diki Choyang explained that the supreme religious authority, the Dalai Lama, paved the way for democracy because people had faith in him. She concluded that religion goes deeper than democracy. This book, thus, is about the gift of democracy that has been given top-down by a religious and political leader in exile to a people in exile. In the process of building exile communities outside of Tibet, Tibetan exiles have had to deal with the complicated process of constructing democracy in ways that enable them to speak of a modern form of governance that is also simultaneously essentially Tibetan, since their government-in-exile, the so-called Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), should be a legitimate representative of all Tibetans and a continuation of the traditional Tibetan government. This book shows how the process of democracybuilding has been contained within a framework of what the Tibetans call a ‘freedom struggle’, and how democracy-building has also involved translation. Tibetan translations of democracy, and their

INTRODUCTION

3

manifestations in institutions, procedures, political cultures and discourses in India, have taken particular forms since the translation projects and processes have been restricted by the freedom struggle, and have taken place in specific historical, cultural, and political contexts. Although the Dalai Lama has been commonly perceived as the architect of democracy in exile-Tibetan communities, we shall also see in this book how the act of translating democracy has not ended with his transmission of democracy to Tibetans living in exile. The Tibetan public, too, has taken upon itself to translate the meaning of democracy ‘the Tibetan way’. In fact, they have furnished multiple translations of democracy. What these translations have in common is how they have transformed democracy into a gift: ‘the gift of democracy’. But first, let us look at the historical framework of the freedom struggle, and what it has meant to ‘translate democracy’ within this framework.

A freedom movement in exile Since the first exile exodus in 1959 when the Dalai Lama and 80,000 Tibetans settled in South Asia, and a second wave of Tibetan refugees occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, 127,935 Tibetans have been registered as living in exile. According to the 2009 demographic survey, 94,203 Tibetans reside in India, 13,514 in Nepal and 1,298 in Bhutan; and among the 18,920 Tibetans registered as residents outside of South Asia, 11,112 have established themselves in North America, 1,120 in Australasia, and 5,633 in Europe, with more than half of these European residents in Switzerland.5 Moreover, 58 agricultural, agro-industrial or handicraft-based settlements have been established for Tibetans in South Asia. 39 of these settlements are located in India, established with the help of the government of India and voluntary aid organisations in India (e.g. Mysore Rehabilitation and Development Agency) and abroad (e.g. Swiss Aid). The CTA also run handicraft societies, such as the Tibetan Women’s Handicraft Center in Rajpur, that ideally work as self-sustained communities where Tibetans can live and work together. The model Tibetan is often portrayed as living in a

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settlement, but many Tibetans reside outside of the settlements in rented rooms and houses within Indian communities. Settlements and handicraft societies are often understood to be attempts to gather and isolate Tibetans in order to practise a non-assimilating strategy in exile and resist being absorbed into the host country. To preserve their national identity, culture, religion, language and traditions in exile is thus understood to be crucial for Tibetan exiles, and has subsequently played a significant role in exile politics. If the expressed goal of self-determination is to have any actuality in the future, it is hence important to preserve a distinct nation while in exile. Towards this end, Tibetan exiles have also established special schools for Tibetan children. The main autonomous Tibetan schools in India run by the CTA are the Central School for Tibetans, which until recently were run by the Indian Ministry of Human Resource Development, and the TCV, which are maintained through foreignfunding and sponsorship programmes. In creating their vision of a model citizen, these schools include what they identify as ‘modern knowledge’ together with ‘Tibetan knowledge’ in their curriculum. In this way, the children at these schools are also educated as refugees, patriots and Tibetans.6 Tibetan exiles are often portrayed as a people who, despite being culturally displaced, have successfully adapted to new and foreign circumstances in exile. I once commented to Pema Thinley, the editor of the Tibetan Review, that Tibetan exiles are sometimes perceived as the most successful refugees in the world, even at times as being spoiled. He did not agree. He stressed that exile life is a very insecure life. Tibetan exiles have no social welfare scheme, no health insurance, no permanent residence and no rights. Few Tibetans are citizens in the country of their resettlement, and in India most Tibetan exiles are foreign guests according to India’s 1946 Foreigners Act. Like other foreigners, they have to carry a registration card that must be renewed annually unless they obtain a five-year extension of their permit to stay in India as foreign nationals.7 Though there is no legal basis for it, Tibetans in India generally enjoy the rights and freedoms of Indian citizens, but they are dependent on the goodwill of those exercising the laws locally.

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They are also at the mercy of the changing relations between India and China, which have become strained by the activities of the Tibetan freedom movement. China regularly pressures India to restrict Tibetan activities on Indian soil, but overall the government of India has shown enormous generosity in aiding the Tibetans’ rehabilitation. Not only has the Indian government provided them with shelter, but the cultural, religious and political activities of Tibetan exiles have generally been tolerated, as well as given support and media exposure. Nonetheless, for Pema Thinley, Tibetans have a liminal position in India which causes insecurity and impotency: [In India] you hardly have any opportunities. You’ve no legal status. The sense of being a refugee is compounded by this situation of not having any rights even as a refugee. Whenever there are some problems within the community, the elders especially, their concern is that, ‘You shouldn’t antagonise the local people. This is their country. What if they decide to throw us out? What will you do?’ So you can’t talk about rights, because you are told that you are in no position to talk about your rights.8 This liminal position could be resolved by taking Indian citizenship. In theory, Tibetans can take Indian citizenship if they are born in India before 1987, but it is not a widespread practice, since taking foreign citizenship is often enveloped in ambiguity. Most Tibetans in India have waived their right to citizenship as a sign of being a loyal Tibetan citizen to the CTA and the Dalai Lama. While the CTA permits but discourages dual citizenship,9 Tibetan exiles disagree on the issue of adopting foreign citizenship and the significance of remaining stateless.10 In fact, there is a stigma attached to Tibetans’ naturalization in India, as it is seen by many Tibetans as a declaration of belonging to a different state, culture or identity, as an act of self-exclusion and even as an act of treason. Infamous reminders of this stigma include the occasion when inhabitants from 13 settlements in India applied for Indian citizenship as protest and resistance to the Dharamsala governance in

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1971, and the ongoing Shugden controversy in which some Tibetans have announced their wish for Indian citizenship in order to demonstrate that they do not belong to the sphere of influence centred in Dharamsala.11 Thus, taking Indian citizenship can be seen as a process that is self-activated by those who want to demonstrate that they do not wish to belong to the national community of Tibetans represented by and organised under the leadership of the CTA in Dharamsala. The Central Tibetan Administration The North Indian hill station Dharamsala has become the cultural and political capital of the Tibetan freedom movement in exile. The establishment of Dharamsala as the seat of exile has entailed a number of political manoeuvres enacted by the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), along with numerous organisations and communities of Tibetans, in order to organise in agreement with democratic principles. According to the CTA, the Chinese occupation of Tibet has deprived Tibetans of political selfdetermination and the freedom to express and honour their own culture and religious conviction. The stated purpose of the cumulative efforts constituting a political movement among Tibetan exiles is to fight for a free and democratic Tibet, and to prepare for a return to a new Tibet in the future. Important objectives related to this goal have included: the preservation of culture, i.e. the continuation of the Tibetan nation; and democratisation, i.e. the modernisation of governance. The freedom movement of the Tibetan exiles has been formed with the purpose to assist the Tibetan freedom struggle under the leadership of the Dalai Lama in several ways: as a government-inexile, as non-governmental organisations, as a Tibetan guerrilla, as an exile army under Indian patronage and, since 2007, as a ‘massmovement’. However, the official goal of the Dalai Lama and the CTA, along with some of the exile-Tibetan organisations, has transformed over a period of several years from struggling for ‘independence’ (rang btsan) to ‘autonomy’ (rang srid rang skyong) in Tibet. Furthermore, guerrilla warfare has been abandoned in favour of

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diplomacy and non-violent means of protest, although violence against oneself in the form of hunger strikes and self-immolation has also been applied as desperate means of political protest.12 The freedom movement has constructed a government-in-exile that employs ‘state-like techniques of governmentality in order to speak and act like a state for domestic and external audiences. . .’.13 As eminently unfolded in a number of articles by McConnell, this unrecognised and extraterritorial government-in-exile is operating from the territory of a sovereign state, i.e. India, and is applying strategies of biopolitics. McConnell has related three moments of CTA biopolitics which testify to the importance of governing the exile population, even without territory and sovereignty: observing its population through census and statistics; normalising its population through discourses; and managing its population through regulatory acts.14 State-like functions performed by the CTA has included holding regular democratic elections, issuing passports, census-taking, establishing embassies, as well as organising an education system, social welfare schemes and a taxation system.15 The CTA has been the main actor regulating Tibetan exile societies, as well as the main mediator between Tibetan exiles and foreign governments and NGOs. 16 Its foremost spokesperson, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, has travelled extensively abroad and has established 11 foreign missions to assist his outreach in Brussels, Canberra, Geneva, Kathmandu, London, Moscow, New Delhi, New York, Pretoria, Taipei and Tokyo. The Dalai Lama has also, until recently, been the head of the CTA, which has called itself the ‘Tibetan Government-in-Exile’ (btsan byol bod gzhung) and collectively refers to the Tibetan administration in exile, which includes ‘the cabinet’ (bka’ shag) and ‘the parliament’ (bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs). In 2011, the Dalai Lama devolved his political power within this government-in-exile and changed the Tibetan name to ‘Central Administration of Tibetan People’ (dbus bod mi’i sgrig ‘dzugs).17 Thus, the exile set-up was no longer a ‘government’ but an ‘administration’. A government-in-exile, as defined by Reisman, is a counter-elite of a territorially external group of aspirants to the power and authority of a government controlled by others.18 With this in mind, this change

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in names may signal a move away from claiming international diplomatic recognition as a government-in-exile. For some Tibetans, such as those organised in the Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC), this has also signalled that the Dharamsala headquarters has abandoned its claim to be the legitimate representative of the Tibetans, thus giving up the fight against China in liberating Tibet.19 The TYC has pointed to the historical title and symbol of the Tibetan government-in-exile, and argued that by changing its title and symbol, the continuation to the past government of Tibet – the Ganden Phodrang (bod gzhung dga’ ldan pho brang) – has been broken. One of the profiles, Sherab Woeser, in his obituary on Ganden Phodrang, expressed it as such: It is improper for me to be saying this now, now that you no longer are, but I believe you had many more rewarding decades of life in you still left. The total respect that you commanded in the hearts of Tibetans, oppressed and free, reflected your potential to serve us better than any alien government or exile institution. The deep-rooted love and emotional connect you enjoyed with us, your people, across the globe is a proof to the historic loyalty that we have for you, passed down through generations of Tibetans.20 Similar assessments that I have heard within the circles of the TYC (see Chapters 3 and 4) and read about on the internet have argued that the quality of democracy would increase as the Dalai Lama reduced his influence, but, they admitted, he should at least remain the head of state ‘in a purely ceremonial capacity’.21 Moreover, since the Dalai Lama has given up his political responsibility and taken with him the title of the Ganden Phodrang, which originally had been the name of the Fifth Dalai Lama’s personal estate, the Dalai Lama has now also deprived the Tibetan government-in-exile of its historical legitimacy by not letting it use the name. This was also what the American-based, Tibetan intellectual and critic Jamyang Norbu lamented:

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Since 1642 the Ganden Phodrang has been the government of Tibet, and the legitimacy of the present exile government rests in the minds of all Tibetans on the fact that it is an unbroken continuation of the same government that ruled in Lhasa before. If you took the name away you, in effect, ended the legitimacy of the government. If the exile government was not Ganden Phodrang any more, then the 49,184 exile Tibetans who cast their votes this year were not participating in democratic election for a new prime minister and parliament, but rather in elections for the chairman and board of directors, or something on those lines, of a refugee organization or administration.22 Other Tibetans kept quiet about how they felt about the namechange decision, and some were bewildered or shattered by the new development. Had the Dalai Lama abandoned them and upon leaving terminated the government? Was this attempt to strengthen the democracy in reality weakening the government? The name change was downplayed by the Dalai Lama’s office and the outgoing prime minister Samdhong Rinpoche, for instance, by insisting that this move did not diminish the legitimacy of CTA.23 Samdhong Rinpoche also assured the exile-Tibetan society that the name change was a preventive measure put into place in order to counter possible future, ambiguous legal positions of the Tibetan exiles’ administration and to ensure the continuity of the Tibetan freedom struggle.24 The CTA – whether it is called a government-in-exile or an administration – is disconnected from the territory that it claims and from the majority of its citizens. The claimed territory does not match the existing borders of the political entity of Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR, established in 1965) under the People’s Republic of China. The CTA aspires for an autonomous region of Tibet which consists of the present TAR which corresponds to the central Tibetan province of Utsang, in addition to the eastern Tibetan provinces of Kham and Amdo that had been split up and incorporated into the Chinese provinces of Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan

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and Yunnan. The Fourteenth Dalai Lama is often presented as the deposed leader of an independent Tibet that once consisted of the three Tibetan regions (chol kha gsum) of Utsang, Kham and Amdo and has had a long history of independence. Tibet, in this official Tibetan version, had been ruled by a line of Tibetan kings since 127 BC , had risen to greatness during the Fifth Dalai Lama’s reign in 1642 when he established the Ganden Phodrang, and was ruled by the government headed by the Dalai Lamas until 1951 when it was illegally occupied by the People’s Republic of China.25 The CTA thus claims to be the continuation of this government transplanted in India, and therefore, has a historical and legal right to represent ‘all Tibetans whether at home or abroad’ (gzhis byes bod mi yongs).26 Despite the establishment of a state-like polity in India and the democratisation of this governing body, no foreign power has formally granted diplomatic recognition to the CTA as a government-in-exile. Attaining international diplomatic recognition as a legitimate representative of a nation is important due to the diplomatic privileges which accompany recognition, such as: inclusion into diplomatic relations; membership in international and multilateral institutions; and, ultimately, recognition as ‘a political mechanism to advance exiled aspirants to power’.27 Shain’s study of international recognition practices has confirmed that international recognition is frequently based upon democratic legality through the ‘automatic non-recognition approach’ which withholds recognition from governments that come to power through ‘extraconstitutional means’.28 In effect, this means that contenders to state power (also exiled ones) who are democratically elected can be recognised as the legitimate rulers and representatives of a people although they do not control the state machinery.29 In addition, territorial integrity, self-determination, human rights, legality and democracy are often principles which are interchangeably invoked by governments to justify recognition policies. This has also been true for the recognition practices employed by the United Nations. However, as Shain has pointed out, several examples exist where these ideals have cancelled one another, and a government may enjoy recognition ‘despite its criminal human rights record and lack

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of popular support at home’.30 Hence, the Chinese government, which has not emerged from free and fair elections, has nonetheless been internationally accepted as the legitimate government ruling Tibet as an integral part of China, since it ‘exercise[s] effective control over its territory by possessing the state’s machinery’.31 The CTA has not been recognised in international law, and its numerous appeals to the United Nations and to the world community have not resulted in the hoped-for political support. Foreign governments and international organisations have treated the Tibetan issue as China’s internal affair, and Tibetan exiles have only received symbolic declarations of support. However, even though the CTA has been restricted to work on the level of non-governmental organisations, this has not prevented the CTA from receiving aid and entering diplomatic relations, as the CTA has done a great deal to obtain operational and diplomatic assistance from abroad. Swiss and US intergovernmental organisations, Tibet support groups, the UNHCR, and Taiwan’s Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (MTAC), as well as individual sponsorships from sympathisers around the world have financially supported the Tibetan exiles’ resettlement and operations outside Tibet. In fact, Tibetan exiles have become dependent upon foreign patrons.32 Tibetans can be considered as political exiles in the sense that they reside temporarily in a guest country, where they are politically active in varying degrees in order to ‘create circumstances favourable to their return’, as defined by Shain.33 Political exiles have different degrees of political engagement, and in Iwan´ska’s terminology, one can distinguish among ‘core members’ who are politically active and closely associated with a government-in-exile, the ‘rear guard members’ who are temporarily politically passive and the rest of the ‘diaspora’ who comprise the pool of potential members of the political exile movement.34 A political exile can thus refer to a fully committed person who devotes all her time to the freedom struggle or to a person who merely pays tax to the government-in-exile. In Tibetan Studies, ‘diaspora’ rather than ‘exile’ has increasingly become a favoured analytical concept to unlock the predicament of Tibetans living outside of Tibet. Lau has made a strong argument for

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applying the term ‘diaspora’ and enhancing the simultaneous and diverse multiple centres in diasporic constellations, along with the shifting centre– periphery relationships that have become evident in the lives of South Asian Tibetans.35 Likewise, Anand argues that the notion of diaspora is useful to comprehend South Asian Tibetans’ identity politics and intercultural experiences; and others, such as Venturino and Stro¨m, have convincingly applied the term in ways that can inform general theories.36 Despite their arguments for applying the analytical concept of ‘diaspora’, I have chosen to use the term ‘exile’, which is also the most commonly employed term among Tibetan analysts and political commentators, both within and outside of the CTA, to explain their circumstances. Their preference for the notion ‘exile’, and in the distinction between what I have called ‘exile temporality’ versus ‘diaspora permanence’ is, I argue, a key to understanding exile politics in a Tibetan context and is discussed further in Chapter 6. Furthermore, political exiles who organise a government-in-exile struggle to mobilise international support for their claim to be the legitimate representative of their nation. The kind of legitimacy that political exiles seek includes loyalty and recognition, in the sense of national and international support for claims to power, respectively. Shain has persuasively argued that loyalty and recognition are crucial for political exiles, which has also been true for Tibetans. In the Tibetan context, the great majority of Tibetan political exiles have been united in a political cause organised under the CTA, with the Dalai Lama as their prime leader, and they have displayed loyalty to the CTA and the Dalai Lama in several ways, as will be exemplified throughout this book, particularly in Chapter 6. The Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile, which was instituted in 1991 by the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, describes the fundamental principles of CTA governance and the rights and duties of its populace.37 According to article 13 of the charter, citizens of the CTA are tax-paying Tibetan exiles: Tibetans above the age of six residing in exile are expected to make financial contributions to the CTA, the so-called ‘voluntary tax’ (dwang blang dpya khral), collected by the association that calls itself the Tibetan Freedom Movement (bod rang dbang bden pa’i las ‘gul).

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Not everybody pays this yearly token amount, but the tax is unavoidable if one wants to benefit from the services and programmes administered by the CTA, such as poverty-alleviation programmes, international scholarship and resettlement schemes and voting privileges. Annual contributions are specified in the ‘green book’ (deb ljang khu), a document that can only be carried by Tibetans living outside Tibet who are recognised as Tibetan nationals and registered in exile.38 The tax duty actually determines Tibetan exiles’ democratic rights, since it is only green book holders with duly paid taxes who have the right to vote in national and local elections in exile. The green book is also a proof of status as a political exile, yet a valid green book gives no rights in the host country. Moreover, the Tibetan freedom movement has established a number of symbols which work to strengthen national cohesion within an ‘imagined community’,39 such as a national anthem and a national flag. Additionally, there is a ceremonial calendar that brings Tibetans together as one united people for festivals, celebrations and commemorations, such as: the Tibetan Uprising Day on 10 March, the Dalai Lama’s birthday on 6 July, Democracy Day on 2 September, and the Human Rights Day coinciding with the celebration of Dalai Lama’s Nobel Peace Prize on 10 December. Apart from these national holidays, there are several dates which demarcate annual demonstration days among organisations, such as the birthday of the Panchen Lama and the founding day of the Tibetan Youth Congress. Also, the documents that Tibetan exiles carry have a strong symbolic value. Their registration card proves that they are temporary foreign guests in India and the green book acts as a symbol of loyalty.40 In an instrumental perspective, the CTA and exile-Tibetan organisations employ a ‘symbolic arsenal’ of everyday rhetoric and representations of the nation to evoke patriotism among national compatriots and maintain an image of belonging to one nation,41 similar to the banal nationalism described by Billig.42 The unity of the nation in exile is furthermore strengthened by creating links to the past, and the manner in which the past is remembered in turn shapes imaginations related to democracy.

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One past, one nation ‘The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there’ is the opening line of Hartley’s 1953 novel The Go-Between.43 The line reminds us that, like a foreign country, the past is distanced from us, while the present is our common and well-known homeland. For Tibetan exiles, however, the past is not a foreign country. Being political exiles, they long for a home which existed in the past, while the present is a foreign country. In the collective memories of the past, some elements are selectively enhanced and have become symbols of what they wish to return to. The image of the majestic Potala – the palace of previous generations of Dalai Lamas towering over Lhasa – embellishes many Tibetan cafe´ walls in India. Even the capital of their exile, Dharamsala, has a strong symbolism in that it is replete with institutions, shops and restaurants that have taken the names of what they have lost and of where they are longing for.44 The signs of a lost and distant ‘fatherland’ ( pha yul), the symbols of what they wish to return to, are everywhere. Tibet of the past, like other pasts, is depicted as timeless and essential, rather than dynamic and developing. In public memory, Tibet is chiefly remembered as a place that for centuries had been a peaceful Buddhist sanctuary and is now violated by Chinese colonisers. Barnett has identified an exile-Tibetan discourse stemming from the middle of the 1980s which emphasises Tibet as a place where Chinese colonisers have violated the Tibetan ‘specialness’, referring to portrayals of Tibetan culture and nation as unique.45 Tibetan exiles often claim a uniqueness in their Englishlanguage discourses, as Barnett has shown, and there are innumerable examples of the same in Tibetan-language discourses as well.46 ExileTibetan discourses concerning a Tibetan past are partly a response to Western visions of Tibet as a land of harmony and Buddhist wisdom, expressed in essentialist and exotic terms, such as a Shangri-La. The image of Tibet as Shangri-La, a repository of wisdom, magic and harmony, has appealed to Western sensibilities and has become a dominant discourse regarding Tibet in the twentieth century.47 The way in which exiles relate to the past has also been a response to Chinese discourses in which Tibet has been depicted as a backward

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and feudal serfdom ruled by ferocious priests and aristocrats who bound the people to slavery. In an official Chinese version,48 not only did the Chinese liberators rightfully incorporate Tibet into the motherland, but they also brought civilisation to Tibet. They set modern and democratic reforms into motion and put an end to the monopoly that the upper class and priests have had over culture, education and land. This reading touches upon a part of the Tibetan past that causes uneasiness among Tibetan exiles as well, and concerns the central position of chos, or religion, in Tibetan culture, society and governance. Regardless of whether the viewpoint is a Chinese, Tibetan or Western one, most descriptions of the Tibetan nation’s particularity place chos in a central position. Contemporary academic writers often treat chos and religion as quasi-synonyms, but frequently, as I discovered through interviews and published exile-Tibetan material, when Tibetans talk about chos, it usually refers not to religion in general (i.e. to Islam, Christianity, and so forth), but to the teachings of the Buddha.49 The majority of Tibetans today see Buddhism as essential for defining the Tibetan nation, since they see Tibet as inhabited mainly by Tibetan Buddhists, and that Buddhism was the main characteristic that distinguished Tibetans from their neighbours. Some will also argue that a pan-Tibetan identity rooted in Tibetan Buddhism has been strengthened by the Chinese presence in Tibet and the Tibetans’ state of exile.50 Chos, whether it is translated as religion or Buddhism, has often been paired with Tibetan politics. This, in turn, has firmly established the uniqueness of the Tibetan nation and its distinction from other cultures, especially the Chinese. Political exiles aspire towards a nation with a culture that is distinct and distinguishable, and in that way they are not only adapting and promoting their culture in order to fit their exile circumstances, but they also claim an essential Tibetan identity.51 In the words of Venturino: ‘Clearly, to many Tibetans in the diaspora, appeals to a stable, genuine, historical identity are deeply felt characteristics of an essential individual, society, and spiritual purpose.’52 Likewise, Tibetan culture is often positioned as a distinctly unique Tibetan character which is highlighted as a support for their identity as a distinct and separate

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nation. This assertion of distinction has been a necessary manoeuvre in order to forward claims of self-determination vis-a`-vis China and the international community. Chos provides the sui generis of governance ‘the Tibetan way’, but it is nonetheless apparent that Tibetans relate to governance in the past with a certain uneasiness. For example, the influence of religion on politics, together with the nobility’s power, has been raised among many Tibetans as upholding hierarchies, class differences and discrimination in pre-1951 Tibet. Similarly, many Tibetans believe that a conservative religious force, out of fear of losing power and resources, have hampered the modern reforms which were initiated by the Thirteenth Dalai Lama (such as secular education and the development of a modern army), and by the current Fourteenth Dalai Lama in exile (such as democratisation). Another tension surrounding chos is that several Tibetan exiles believe that an exaggerated priority placed upon chos has meant that political affairs in pre-1951 Tibet were neglected. Critical voices today even suggest that this has led to the loss of Tibetan independence and ultimately to the Dalai Lama having to seek refuge in India. Hence, the central positioning of chos in this rendering has led to the tragedy of Tibet.

The modern moment ‘Loss of independence was a blessing in disguise’ says a contemporary catchphrase among Tibetan exiles. For many of the Tibetan interlocutors who have provided the data for this book, this catchphrase has served as a point of departure for their explanation of modern development in exile, revealing how exile itself has been the absolute most powerful incentive for change, of which ‘democracy’ (dmangs gtso or mang gtso) and ‘modern education’ (deng dus kyi shes yon) were the most important transformations in the Tibetan society which have developed outside of Tibet since 1959. According to the monk-scholar and former prime-minister-in-exile Samdhong Rinpoche in a speech to the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, the exileTibetan democratisation process has been one of the positive effects brought upon by the Chinese occupation of Tibet. He doubted that this would have been possible if their fatherland had remained their

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own.53 In this dominant meta-narrative, the condition of exile has thrown Tibetans into a process that has induced a dissemination of their chos and culture throughout the world and induced the Dalai Lama to provide education and give the gift of democracy to every Tibetan, contrary to pre-exile times when only aristocrats and the clergy received an education and could rule Tibet. In short, entering exile is often seen by Tibetans as what has catapulted them into the age of modernity and can indeed be seen as a ‘modern moment’, to borrow a term from Appadurai. It is ‘a single moment – call it the modern moment – that by its appearance creates a dramatic and unprecedented break between the past and the present’.54 The modern moment serves as the dividing line between tradition and modernity, and in the Tibetan case, it is conceived as a break with the relative isolation and strong resistance towards modern influences. Seeing pre-1959 Tibet as a closed, stagnant, and traditional society thrust into modernity as a consequence of the exile exodus has not been unusual – among both Tibetans and those who study their communities. The Indian scholar Saklani, for example, in her extensive study on continuity and change in three Tibetan communities in India, advocated the bipolar view of opposing modernity with tradition, which has been often relayed in Tibetan discourse as well.55 Saklani explored the effects of the Tibetans’ flight from Tibet, how they met ‘the fast blowing winds of change’ in India and adapted to the new circumstances.56 Saklani regarded Tibetan exiles as particularly interesting because she considered the pre-1959 Tibetan society to be static and traditional, whereas the Indian setting forced Tibetans to become more modern. Tibetans’ reaction to this modernity, Saklani argued, was change-resistant, because the majority of Tibetan exiles, in ‘the spirit of nationalism’, wanted to preserve ‘the core of the old order’.57 Yet Saklani recognised a conflict between the overwhelming majority’s wish to preserve the old order and their attraction to the West. Although Saklani’s articulation of the dilemmas that Tibetans faced in exile – through the dichotomies of the old and the new, the traditional and the modern, the local and the foreign, change and preservation – was problematic, she rightly highlighted how Tibetans have often been caught between several

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tensions in exile. She enunciated how Tibetans have experienced exile as a way to live in a world that is different from their pre-modern past, and that in so many ways might be undermining tradition. In other ways, however, the ‘modern moment’ has strengthened what is considered to be Tibetan tradition, for instance by the establishment of preservation of culture institutions, such as the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts and the Norbulingka Institute in Dharamsala, and the canonisation of what is understood to be Tibetan culture, e.g. songs, dress, food, etc. In any case, modernity is indeed a powerful trope employed among Tibetans in India and prevalent in both everyday lives and democratisation politics. In Koselleck’s exposition of the semantic history of ‘modernity’, he explains modernity as a form of temporality in which the present is experienced as an overcoming of the past, in the sense that we experience a qualitative newness or progress – a ‘new time’ (neuzeit) – in which the future is an open horizon of expectation.58 Modernity is one of those globally circulating concepts to which there is no escape, but at the same time, it is a polysemic and multifaceted term that is difficult to define and impossible to identify in one singular institution or practice. Modernity has variously been studied as an historical epoch, a quality of social experience and a project. In this latter sense, modernity can be a political goal that is yet to be obtained and towards which there are ‘a series of interlinked projects – that certain people in power seek to achieve’ as so captivatingly unfolded by Asad.59 These interlinked projects are the creations of the European enlightenment, such as capitalism, civil equality, constitutionalism, consumerism, democracy, freedom of the market, human rights, individualisation, industrialism, materialism, moral autonomy, rationality and secularism. When understanding modernity to be an idealised Western prototype that is universally valid and applicable, some scholars seem to assume that it is towards these exalted parameters that modernisation can be measured. Ong pointed to this when she wrote: ‘The hegemonic Euroamerican notion of modernity – as spelled out in modernisation theory and theories of development – locates the non-West at the far end of an escalator rising toward the West, which is at the pinnacle of

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modernity in terms of capitalist development, secularisation of culture, and democratic state formation.’60 Modernisation as equivalent to secularisation is one such assumption about democracy. Secularisation is often understood to be a process which is expressed in several negative ways, as in the ‘decline in church membership and attendance, marginalisation of the church from public life, dominance of scientific explanations of the world’,61 which has also been the case in some countries in Europe (where it originated), in addition to Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, but not in the United States. In its connection to modernisation, secularisation is often narrowly interpreted as a loss of religion or the absence of religion, which are understood to be key features of the modern nation state. Enlightenment thinkers perceived religion (or more specifically Christianity) as a form of irrational or false knowledge of the world, and they were hostile towards religious institutions.62 They therefore professed that in order to promote individual liberties, the church and the state should be separated. Weber, moreover, theorised that secularism, which was a basic element of modernity, involved the separation of certain conflictual value spheres (e.g. religious, economic, political, social), but also the differentiation of institutions63 which has inspired ideals promoted within political science and sociology of the autonomy of the state, economy, and civil society64 – all of which are ideas that we at times encounter in circulating discourses among Tibetans in India. The secularisation thesis, in these understandings, thus, asserts there to be ‘a process of functional differentiation and emancipation of secular spheres – primarily the modern state, the capitalist market economy and modern science – from the religious sphere’.65 It is this well-known paradigm of secularism that has informed many modernisation projects and processes outside of its European origin. The validity, or even the universality, of this form of secularity has been identified as an unavoidable dimension in the unilinear history of progress and modernisation. Taylor has paired the advance of the modern nation state with the upsurge of secularism and identified in secularism a global relevance and applicability in those societies that have become modern – including non-Christian

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societies. He argued that ‘the inescapability of secularism flows from the nature of the modern state. More particularly, from the nature of the democratic state.’66 According to Taylor, in these modernisation processes, religion has become rationalised and spirituality has become personalised. Furthermore, religion has become irrelevant to citizenship since citizens of the modern democratic polity first and foremost identify as a ‘modern citizen’ which takes precedence over other identities, including the religious, and these modern citizens are committed to the higher goal of the polity and solidarity towards fellow citizens. This means that allegiance to other group identities (e.g. regional or religious) often becomes subordinate to national patriotism.67 In contrast, opponents towards this ‘Western’ exemplar of secularism have argued that the ideal of a separation of value spheres has never been practised fully,68 and various church–state relations must be considered ‘unsecular entanglements’.69 In the Nordic countries the Lutheran church has a privileged position; in Greece the Orthodox church is the officially established church; and even in laicist France, the state has funded Catholic schools. Additionally, opponents have argued that a separation of church and state and the separation of value spheres should not be the benchmark for determining the levels of modernisation.70 And where some have used religious values in a confrontational clash with what has been considered to be secularism, a less confrontational resistance has furthermore been noticeable among others who offer their own understandings of secularism, understandings which include spirituality or religion. For instance, Jawaharlal Nehru, independent India’s first prime minister, recognised secularism as one of the ‘pillars of modernity’, yet the Indian model for modernity did not expel religions from the sphere of politics, but secured religious tolerance within the political sphere.71 Whether one is opposed to this thesis or not, the Enlightenment’s religion– secular binary has become a ‘commonplace dichotomy’,72 and the general postulation has been that with increased modernisation, people will cease believing and practising religion. Flipped around, to be secular also means, in the words of Casanova:

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‘to be modern, and therefore, by implication, to be religious means to be somehow not yet fully modern’.73 Nonetheless, it is obvious that religion has not disappeared from the modern world.74 Also, Berger, one of the most influential proponents of the secularisation thesis in America, has admitted that religion continues to have importance globally.75 It is similarly evident that we see different forms of secularism, and that modernisation can release new forms of secularism as well as revitalise the spiritual in the public sphere.76 Both within and outside of modern secular states, ethnographical evidence has shown how religion has occupied very divergent positions77 and has taken on multiple meanings. In the same way, Tibetan translations of secularity point in different directions: as the absence of religion, fundamentalist atheism, anti-sectarianism, freedom of religion and religious tolerance (discussed in-depth in Chapter 4). Along these lines, the secular, secularisation and secularism mean different things to different people, as is evident in a Tibetan context, in Asia and elsewhere.78 Although modernity has a particular European geneology as aptly shown by, for example, Asad,79 and although the binary oppositions of tradition and modernity are highly problematic, Tibetans do raise the modernity – tradition binary. They see modernity – tradition as conflicting trends of different origin, value orientations and histories, and they articulate discourses concerning dimensions of modernity, including individualisation, materialism, rationality, secularisation, and so forth. Thus, their narratives are obviously informed by Euroamerican dominant discourses in which a Western model is the ideal, and we can expect, as Ong has established in a general context, that ‘the imaginaries and practices of modernity are developing in different sites, are in dialogue with one another, and, in an emerging region of the world, are challenging Western hegemony’.80 It is these observations of modernity in different locations which testify to the impossibility of replicating an ideal-type modernity. Furthermore, there are different ways to be modern, or people have made claims to different versions of modernity. Thus, we see a pluralisation of modernity recognised in notions such as ‘alternative

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modernites’, ‘multiple modernities’, or ‘modernity at large’.81 Ong has argued that it is impossible to talk about modernity in the singular since even in ‘the West’ there is no single modernity. Moreover, the many versions circulating in ‘the East’ are not ‘immature versions of some master Western prototype’.82 According to Ong, the modernity that is developing in South East Asia is ‘an alternative definition of modernity that is morally and politically differentiated from that of the West’.83 If we look beyond the commonly referred to dimensions of modernity (i.e. industrialism and capitalism) and focus instead on the reflexivity of modernity, we can see how the constant flow of new knowledge forces people into a continuous altering and re-organising of their perception of reality.84 The post-traditional order, which is considered to be modernity, is the discontinuity of what is perceived as the stable and repetitive past. Though the ‘modern moment’ demarcates a break with the past, I argue throughout this book that this break is not final. This is mostly due to projects of modernity, represented by, for instance, democracy, being negotiated in relation to that which is remembered and commemorated as the past and that which is deemed viable for ensuring the continuation of a nation in exile in the age of modernity. One of my interlocutors elaborated upon a similar idea that displacement was a fast-forward move to modernity. Like many other Tibetans pursuing higher education in India, 24-year-old MA student Sangye Tendar lived in a small Tibetan enclave in the middle of where many of these so-called modernities meet. He studied in cosmopolitan Bangalore, and he had contemplated modernity and whether there was a modernity that could be Tibetan. From his modest bachelor den in this mega-city, he explained to me that modernity, in his opinion, involved selection and syncretism of the Tibetan past and the modern present: Before we lost our independence, Tibetan society was a kind of medieval society. The Dalai Lama came to India and introduced democracy. That’s one modernising. Modernising doesn’t mean Westernising. Westernising means copying everything,

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copying cultures from the West. Modernising means copying good things from them.85 Thus, the definition here is not an alternative modernity in Ong’s sense, i.e. ‘to represent their nation as modern without being Western’,86 but Sangye Tendar’s interpretation of modernity resembled the message that the Dalai Lama had for the Tibetans at the beginning of their exile in India. The Dalai Lama encouraged the newly arrived Tibetans to take both the good from their past and the good from modernity when making a new life in exile (discussed in Chapter 1). It is the modern moment, the Tibetans’ displacement, which has provided Tibetan exiles with possibilities to selectively adopt and create new national imaginations. Cultural selection and syncretism have nevertheless been restricted by the need to secure the exile-Tibetan nation’s link to the past. Exiles must claim a Tibetan heritage and ‘be Tibetans’, otherwise they will disappear as a nation, and the past will be lost forever. They do not agree, however, as to which parts of the past and which parts of modernity might be beneficial for them and their political aims. Similarly, in this regard, Appadurai understands the idea of a modern moment as problematic since it is ‘unevenly experienced’.87 This is a key point. Although coming to exile might be collectively imagined by Tibetan exiles as the modern moment, how they experience and imagine modernity varies. In this way, Tibetans in India are not a homogenous population sharing an unequivocal, single experience called exile. Among those born in exile, some have grown up in a safe and enclosed Tibetan settlement and have only moved into the larger Indian society when they, as young adults, went to Indian cities for business or for higher education. Even then they kept together in Tibetan social networks or organisations. Other exiles have grown up as the only ethnic Tibetans in an Indian society far away from the Dalai Lama and Dharamsala, only to be exposed to a Tibetan community when they were adults. There are also Tibetans who received a very different education into what it means to be Tibetan and grew up as orphans in the boarding schools of TCV or Christian missionary schools (the latter group has

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mostly become Indian citizens). Finally, there are the so-called ‘new arrivals’ (gsar ‘byor) who grew up in Tibet as nomads or city-dwellers and who later chose or were forced into exile. Furthermore, among the different generations, there is a multiplicity of experiences and imaginations: the first generation of exiles came to India believing that they would soon return to Tibet together with the Dalai Lama; their children – the second generation of exiles – grew up in India, were born as refugees, received education and were exposed to discourses coming from various directions; the third generation of Tibetans – those who are in the schools today – were born into a relatively efficient system that raises them as Tibetans, but also exposes them to various discourses on modernity and conflicting values about Tibetanness. What lived experiences do these very different Tibetans-in-exile share? The modernities that they live or imagine must surely be as various as their experiences. It is obvious that these very different Tibetans experiencing modernity unevenly also do not unanimously remember the Tibetan past as a romantic Shangri-La. Of course, it is neither possible nor desirable for Tibetan exiles to recreate an exact replica of the past. The Dalai Lama and the CTA have repeatedly declared that in a future free Tibet, they do not want to reinstall the traditional Tibetan government. In fact, according to the Dalai Lama, the remedy for past mistakes within Tibetan polity is democracy. Ever since the beginning of his exile, he has worked to build a new Tibet in continuation with what he has deemed the good elements of the Tibetan past, to which he has wanted to add new insights acquired in exile. In this way Tibetan exiles can ensure a bond with the past – a bond which at least is symbolic. A collective memory has thus been created of the homeland which has enabled Tibetan exiles to negotiate what to preserve and what to dispose of when preparing to build a modern Tibet that is based on democratic principles.

Democracy and democratisation, in theory Democracy is not uniformly accepted, nor is it universally practised.88 First of all, democracy is contested; it has not established

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itself as a hegemonic ideology in, for example, Asia and the Middle East. Secondly, wherever democracy has been accepted, it has been constructed differently. Even within a given culture, the very notion and form of democracy has been disputed. Therefore, as reflected in the central thesis of this book, it is necessary within democracy and democratisation studies to explore how democracy has been differently translated within cultures. Throughout this book, I refute the simple reductionism of understanding democracy to be a global discourse or universal value which can be implemented across all cultures yet given a local flavour. I moreover argue against any existence of any one ‘Asian democracy’. This is because within any democratisation, democracy is necessarily translated. Democracy manifests in different forms in various societies because imaginations regarding democracy are both enabled and bound by politics, history, culture, and so forth. For Tibetan exiles, it is the cultural dimension of democracy that links exile governance to the past and to the homeland, and towards which they struggle to return. Nonetheless, neither culture nor democracy is homogeneously understood and interpreted by all exiles. Instead, the translation of democracy, what it means and how culture is infused into this translation is contested. Empirical evidence for the manifold manifestations of democracy worldwide supports my argument that democracy has to be studied as a translated and constructed concept. Such an approach has the advantage of being able to encapsulate the multiplicity of interpretations of democracy which are evident in the manifold conceptions of democracy that circulate. Conceptions of democracy The word ‘democracy’ originates from ancient Athens and means ‘rule by the people’, i.e. ‘kratos’ by the ‘demos’.89 Throughout history, the definition of demos has been a source of heated debates regarding who belongs to the community and who should rule. It was not until the late twentieth century that Europeans could enjoy citizenship on equal grounds, were considered capable of deciding what was best for the community and were thus considered fit to vote.90 The aspect of ‘anti-paternalism’,91 i.e. when ordinary people are seen as capable of

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deliberating and deciding for the benefit of the community, is especially relevant for the case of exile Tibetans who have had to negotiate democracy and accommodate it within a polity that has traditionally been in the hands of the elite – an elite which included the aristocracy and clergy headed by a succession of Dalai Lamas who had an elevated status within Tibetan society. Although demos today ideally refers to equal and empowered citizens, in reality, people are never fully equal or equally empowered. Moreover, the seemingly self-explanatory appearance of demos – as if ‘people’ is already pre-given and pre-political92 – is increasingly questioned today. Demos has proved difficult to define in a multi-communal state such as India, in a supranational institution like the European Union and in a diaspora or exile organisation such as a government-in-exile. It would indeed be more correct to speak of a plural demoi instead of a demos in the singular, as suggested by Bohman among others who encourage us to rethink the very political subject of democracy.93 Various answers to the fundamental question of who is included in the demos or demoi bring to our attention that there are different notions of democracy as well. Heywood, for example, distinguishes between three useful conceptions of demos upon which various democracy models are built: (1) as a single, cohesive body, bound together by a common or collective interest; (2) the numerically strongest cohort that can override the will of the minority; or (3) a collection of free and equal individuals making autonomous decisions.94 The first conception of demos appears to be the one that the Dalai Lama and the CTA have been trying to foster in the Tibetan exile, although the third conception certainly has also been advocated among Tibetans. It was the Athenian model of ‘pure’ or ‘direct democracy’ in which a popular assembly of citizens debated and decided laws and policies that has inspired later democratic ideals and practices.95 With lists of tenets at hand, scholars have argued for the existence of various models for democracy and developed a typology of different democratic political regimes. Though various models of democracy have arisen,96 a beginner’s guide to liberal democracy, which is the most dominant ‘model’, may list the following principles which have been promoted globally as the key elements of democracy:97

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1. Equal citizenship: All adult citizens have an equal right to participate in decisions concerning them. Suffrage embraces all citizens irrespective of race, class, religion, sex, and so forth, and all citizens’ vote have equal weight. This principle has been summarised by the expression ‘one person, one vote’. 2. Citizens’ rights: Rights (and obligations) of citizens are usually included in a legally binding bill of rights forming a part of a written constitution. Citizens’ rights include: the rights of free expression, enquiry, association, communication, public assembly, freedom of conscience, and the right to elect a government and know what it is doing. These rights, regarded as the sine qua non of democracies, are enforced by judges independent of the government. 3. Freedom of expression and independent media: It is necessary to ensure a free public dialogue and information on public matters. There is no room for media monopoly or an officially controlled media. Instead, the idea is that there should be a pluralism of media free from censorship restrictions. Furthermore, access to official information about what the government is doing is necessary to secure accountability. 4. Associational autonomy: Citizens have the right and freedom to organise themselves and form independent associations (e.g. social movements, interest groups and political parties) to further their interests and values. There is a clear distinction between government and civil society. 5. Elections: Representatives for key public offices are not appointed but elected in accordance with the principle of universal and equal suffrage. All adults can in theory oppose the government and stand for elective office. Elections are free and fair, and constitutional changes are determined by the citizens through vote. 6. Institutions of representative and accountable government: There is an institutionalised separation and balance of powers, e.g. by distinguishing between the executive, legislative and judiciary branches of government.

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7. Channels of upward influence: Electors can make their views known to their elected representatives and influence them through a variety of channels. Basic formulations of what democracy should be, such as this list of tenets, has been transferred or translated to other contexts. Global democracy promotion has taken place since World War II, and especially since the Cold War. Many international and multilateral institutions, non-governmental organisations, quasi-governmental organisations and government agencies have encouraged democratisation in developing countries.98 Governments may well find themselves helped, pushed, or even forced to claim democratisation by democracy promoters. International promoters of democracy often seek to assist democratisation processes by advising, educating and financing pro-democracy programmes globally, especially by strengthening democratic elections, good governance, civil society and political party development. Notwithstanding the efforts and money that democracy promoters have mobilised in assisting democracy globally, several regimes have actively resisted democracy. Countries such as Cuba, Burma, North Korea and Syria have never permitted democracy assistance.99 Several countries that have received democracy aid, for example Russia, China and Zimbabwe, have since cracked down on such programmes.100 Democracy promoters, statesmen and popular movements alike have nonetheless believed that democracy is celebrated worldwide as a triumphant idea. Democracy is often positioned as something that has not only inspired people globally, but even proved itself to be universally applicable. Diamond has declared that democracy is ‘preferred by popular majorities in every region of the world that has been surveyed – even the Arab world’.101 Beetham has contended that ‘[n]o one is against democracy today, and everyone claims to be “democratic”’.102 Friedman labelled democracy as the most ‘humanistic form of government’ and democratisation as a ‘truly universal, human phenomenon’.103 Fukuyama hailed ‘the universalisation of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government’.104 And finally,

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some perceive democracy as inciting and generating a kind of human goodness within people. A famous advocate of democracy as a universal value, the 1998 receiver of the Nobel Prize for economy Sen has stated: ‘A country does not have to be deemed for democracy; rather, it has to become fit through democracy.’105 Democratisation and democratic transition It may appear that democracy is moving towards being accepted as a universal value, since a growing number of governments and administrations, from the West to the East, have claimed democracy. Compared to the mid-1970s when two-thirds of all states in the world were considered authoritarian,106 only a third of all states are considered so today. According to the Democracy Index 2014 which assessed 167 countries, 24 countries were categorised as full democracies, 51 flawed democracies, 39 hybrid regimes and 52 authoritarian regimes.107 For the majority, democracy and democratisation have been important means for legitimating power and procedures of governing, both internally as well as towards an external audience. I find it useful to distinguish between the definitions of democracy in terms of its input, i.e. the procedural aspects, and in terms of its output, i.e. in terms of its results. Van Kersbergen and van Waarden have used this distinction to look at how an organisation can become legitimate in the eyes of the citizens: Input legitimacy is when political systems and policies are legitimated by the rules and the processes that created them, i.e. how we reach decisions; output legitimacy is when a political system and policies are legitimated by their success, i.e. what the outcome of a decision is.108 The distinction between input and output aspects of democracy is in this way a useful tool for disentangling the multiple interpretations of democracy. The distinction helps us to locate where democracy germinates its legitimacy in the minds of its translators and to differentiate the various translations and appraisals of democracy. This is also a useful distinction when looking at democratisation processes, in which different translations of democracy are competing and in which dominant translations can change from

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highlighting input aspects to output aspects of democracy (see Chapter 5). When I mention democratisation, I refer to the process of changing a system of governance in order to make structures, organisation and procedures more democratic than they had been previously. Since governments (and the scholars studying them) have subscribed to different democracy models, what democratisation in practice entails varies. For example, O’Donnell and Schmitter have placed citizen rights in the centre of their definition of democratisation: Democratisation, thus, refers to the process whereby the rules and procedures of citizenship are either applied to political institutions previously governed by other principles [. . .], or expanded to include persons not previously enjoying such rights and obligations [. . .], or extended to cover issues and institutions not previously subject to citizen participation.109 Democratisation is, therefore, in their definition, dependent on some form of liberalisation, in the sense that certain rights for citizens are guaranteed and made effective. For O’Donnell and Schmitter, a transition from authoritarianism to democracy presumes liberalisation paired with democratisation. Another related term, ‘democratic transition’, is used to describe the process of political changes where the goal is democratic consolidation and the result is ‘some form of democracy’.110 Transitions to democracy would then conclude with consolidation, in which democracy becomes embedded in a society to the extent that a removal of democracy is less likely.111 Generally, studies on democratisation and democratic transitions are based on the assumption that democracy is universally applicable.112 Most studies have been conducted by political scientists focusing on political changes in authoritarian regimes. Huntington’s book The Third Wave, which describes how democratisation has swept the globe in three phases, has proven to be a strong case. The first two waves (1828–1926 and 1942–62)

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democratised the Western polyarchies, i.e. North America, western Europe and Australasia. The third surge of democratisation started in 1974 with regime changes in southern Europe followed by Latin America and ended with the collapse of communism in eastern Europe in the late 1980s and beginning of the 1990s. In these new democracies, consolidation is considered incomplete because democracy is still contested by other models of governance.113 According to Diamond, the third wave has come to a halt, and the challenge is to prevent a reverse wave of democratic breakdowns, as had happened between the first two waves with the emergence of Fascism and Nazism.114 In 1999, Diamond identified China as a likely candidate for a successful democratisation, claiming that China had started to liberalise politically and had the economic foundation for democracy. China might even be considered a fourth wave in itself, he argued.115 Huntington, in contrast, was not so optimistic. According to him, the growing economic strength in Asia made countries like China increasingly immune to the promotion of human rights and democracy flooding in from the West.116 Just over a decade later, Diamond updated his assessment of the prospects for a democratic breakthrough in China. In 2012 he argued against the possibility of incremental democracy since the Communist Party did not seem to liberalise politically. Instead, he predicted that political change in China will be ‘sudden and disruptive’ and predicted the CCP end of rule within the next ten years.117 Overall, by mapping the transitions that have taken place worldwide, studies on democratisation have considered it possible to arrive at general theoretical insights about democratic transitions. For example, the seminal four-volume work Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, which explores political changes and regime shifts in southern Europe and Latin America, is an important attempt to formulate theoretical insights about democratisation in general.118 Additionally, there are several regional studies on democratisation, of which many explore democratisation in ‘the developing world’ or ‘third world countries’,119 while a few limit themselves to the successes and failed attempts in Asia.120 It is worth noting that such scholarly works and insights have been used by

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democracy promoters for encouraging democratisation in developing countries. When studies on democratisation have a normative and practical viewpoint as their foundation, the conclusions they arrive at must be questioned. Such a critical questioning occurred in the Journal of Democracy in 2002 when core theories regarding democratic transitions were attacked and defended.121 Carothers criticised what he called the ‘transition paradigm’ that in his view was merely a model suited for democracy promoters that were then ‘extended as a universal paradigm for understanding democratisation’.122 Furthermore, he criticised the transition paradigm of generalising theories and schemes as obscuring the real situation. First of all, Carothers argued that the term ‘democratic transition’ is problematic because it is not certain that any country moving away from authoritarian rule is moving towards democracy. Because there is no guarantee of a democratic conclusion, transitions should be seen as openended political change.123 Consequently, the very idea of transition being a uni-directional linear progression of going from one stage of democratisation to another must be questioned. Instead it appears that transition is an idiosyncratic and disorderly process. Likewise, the Tibetan democratisation process has not followed any ideal formula involving particular stages of secularisation or liberalisation, and so forth. A second criticism challenges the idea of temporality itself. Creed has pointed out that the concept of transition implies that transitional countries are in a temporary in-between stage.124 Carothers extended the criticism by arguing that the so-called transition had become a permanent condition for some states. Transition became an everlasting political grey-zone, because such states were ‘neither dictatorial nor clearly headed toward democracy’.125 Therefore, scholars have had to invent new terms to qualify these grey-zone countries, Carothers argued, and listed some terms that scholars applied in order to uphold the paradigm: ‘semidemocracy, formal democracy, electoral democracy, fac ade democracy, pseudodemocracy, weak democracy, partial democracy, illiberal democracy, and virtual democracy’.126 Such ‘democracies

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with adjectives’127 were in fact calling the transition paradigm itself into question. Although O’Donnell, the co-editor of Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, agreed that the outcome of transition is uncertain and that there is nothing predestined in the process, he nevertheless did not believe that transitional countries stagnated in their political development.128 Another pertinent issue regarding democratisation, democracy, and the use of adjectives, involves the underlying idea that it is possible to arrange democracy on a scale going from less to more democracy. This is what enabled scholars to classify regimes as democracies by contriving concepts such as democracy lite, illiberal democracy, guided democracy, limited democracy (democraduras), low intensity democracy, semi-democracy, and the like. These terms describe regimes that have certain democratic features, usually the input aspects of democracy (holding elections), but still combine governance with authoritarianism. The concept of democracy has in uncertain cases been reduced by attaching an adjective. The use of adjectives implies that democracy is diluted. These grey-zone countries are, as Diamond has explained, often deliberately ‘pseudodemocratic’.129 The obvious problem is that grey-zone countries can hide their real (authoritarian) nature behind such icons. Not only will scholars classify countries according to these varying levels of democratisation, but also a regime can call itself a democracy with an adjective, claiming to constitute a particular form of democracy particularly suited to their agenda by adding an adjective to their specific case. Furthermore, allowing for gradations of democracy to grey-zone countries can be utilised to defend non-democratic practices or prevent further democratic developments. This is the case when political opposition is prohibited by calling for a ‘no-party democracy’, as was the case in Museveni’s Uganda until 2005.130 When we look at the exile-Tibetan case, we can point to similar features of the present democratic set-up (such as no-partyism and reserved seats in the parliament to religious sects) that would call upon the observer to place an adjective in front of their label for democracy.

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Following this, it is important to note that when ‘Tibetan democracy’ was chosen as the title of this book, it was neither the intention to classify a Tibetan form of democracy together with other adjectival democracies in order to argue that it is a grey-zone regime, nor was it an attempt to describe a local appropriation of universally applicable democracy. My argument is that everywhere democracy travels and is embraced, it is necessarily translated and takes on different forms. Consequently, democracy in Tibetan communities in India cannot be scrutinised as consisting of an identifiable Tibetan cultural dimension within a global sphere. Agreement is difficult to locate among Tibetans as to what Tibetan culture is, and what elements of democracy found within the Tibetan exile might be considered to be culturally Tibetan. Exploring culturally translated and constructed democracy parameters, nonetheless, reveals how the people involved identify cultural aspects of the system of governance as a result of selective borrowings and cultural syncretism, since they need to negotiate how democracy can be Tibetan and implemented ‘the Tibetan way’. In other words, although I argue that it is problematic to employ adjectives in relation to democracies, it is has been important for many Tibetans to apply a ‘Tibetan’ adjective to their translations of democracy. For Tibetan exiles, democracy needs a Tibetan identity in order to distinguish itself from other democracies. They strive towards a unique form of democracy that is not any less democratic than other forms, but that is culturally suited to Tibetans who can be secular, religious and democratic at the same time. They consider it a Tibetan form of democracy. They are striving towards a Tibetan model for democracy that is unique, that is valuable, and that is suitable for Buddhists and for exiles. Furthermore, the culturally embedded expressions of democracy are not static and permanent, nor are they unequivocal, but are contested within a culture as well. For example, the official interpretation of democracy ‘the Tibetan way’ is conceived differently among Tibetan exiles. For some Tibetans, a suitable democracy model is an enchanted form of secularism. For others, it is a democracy model that is guided by

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Buddhist principles. And for both parties, these models are neither a paradox, nor are they a lesser form of democracy. The cultural translation of democracy – in the Tibetan context as elsewhere – problematises the universalism of democracy, and questions to what degree one can accept cultural particularism and perceive the concept of democracy as translated. Discussions on democracy and democratisation in Asia, moreover, highlight the dilemma of cultural particularism and exceptionalism where some cultures have been deemed unfit for democracy due to their ‘Asian values’. It is in this dilemma that the real problem lies, not in the translations themselves. Universality versus Asian exceptionalism Most democracies in Asia are seemingly ‘new democracies’, in the sense that a consolidation of democracy is considered to be incomplete. Only three enduring democracies, India, Ceylon and Japan, emerged from the collapse of colonial Asia in the 1940s.131 In the beginning of the 1980s, the other 26 regimes in Asia have never been a democracy or had only brief encounters with democracy, except for three other enduring democracies, namely Malaysia, Singapore and Papua New Guinea. There existed several types of regimes in Asia in the 1980s: democracy (six countries), military dictatorship (seven), royal autocratic or colonial regimes (five), Communist Party mobilisation regimes (six) and authoritarian regimes (Afghanistan and Thailand). By the beginning of the 1990s, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, the Philippines, Taiwan, South Korea and Mongolia were in transition to democracy from authoritarian rule.132 Today, according to the Democracy Index 2014, among the world’s 24 full democracies, there are only two Asian countries: Japan (ranked 20) and South Korea (ranked 21).133 Ten Asian countries and territories have made the list of flawed democracies: India (ranked 27), Taiwan (35), Timor-Leste (46), Indonesia (49), Philippines (53), Mongolia (61), Malaysia (65), Hong Kong (66), Papua New Guinea (75) and Singapore (75). At the very bottom of the list are authoritarian countries, with North Korea receiving the most abysmal score and ranked as number 167 out of 167 countries.

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The empirical reality, in Asia as in other parts of the world, is a great deal messier than the list of such classifications reveal. Whether or not a country is a democracy is a question of classification, yet classification is also problematic due to a disorderly empirical reality where the outcome of democratic transitions has been highly uncertain and often problematic. This is why some argue for the existence of hybrid regimes or grey-zone countries, while others argue that countries either are or are not a democracy, yet acknowledging that there are different types of democracy.134 Several of today’s democracies in Asia, for instance the Philippines, have at one time or other experienced reverse waves and democratic regression.135 Tibetan exiles have negotiated the nature of their own democratic reforms within a firsthand experience of democracy in India. The host country of the CTA has been given a special position among Asian democracies,136 hailed as ‘the world’s largest democracy’137 and even ‘a paradigm of democracy’ in terms of free voting.138 The quality of India’s democracy has nonetheless been questioned. Potter, for example, has prophesised a systemic crisis in India due to religious, ethnic and caste conflicts and the ensuing violence.139 ‘Electionrelated killings’ have led Diamond to deem some Indian states like Bihar as illiberal and degraded democracies.140 Moreover, increased state oppression, tougher repressive legislation and stifling of opposition are other factors which threaten democracy in India.141 Furthermore, the growth of a fierce Hindu nationalism, represented by the intolerant Hindu fundamentalist Bharatiya Janata Party, has been a development identified as downgrading Indian democracy.142 Hansen on the other hand, has argued that Hindu nationalism arose from the process of deepening democracy and can be considered within the frames of democracy.143 This means that democracy can give birth to authoritarian and anti-democratic imaginings. Furthermore, Hansen has argued that the discourses claiming communalism in India were ‘results of the specific historiocities and “vernacularization” of democratic discourses and procedures’.144 This assertion, moreover, supports the key argument I forward in this

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book: democracy has to be studied in its cultural specificity; it is always translated and constructed. Scholarly views on democratisation have been based largely on what Carothers has termed the ‘no preconditions outlook’, i.e. that there are no underlying, structural conditions in transitional countries that can influence the onset or outcome of the transition process to any large extent.145 Other scholars have identified a particular Asian exceptionalism in order to explain a general Asian reluctance towards democracy and have particularly highlighted the failed attempts to consolidate democracy in South East and East Asia, invoking a discourse on Asian values.146 Those who argue for the existence of anti-democratic Asian values assert that authoritarian structures, upon which Asian cultures are organised, are evident in Asian societies at all levels. The government is strong and centralised, there is no liberal individualism, and if there is a civil society at all, it is shaped and controlled by the government. Confucian and Islamic cultures in particular have been singled out as being in conflict with democracy, but Buddhism has also been described as incompatible with or even hostile to democracy.147 In this regard Wiarda has advanced the questionable assertion that ‘[n]either in Confucian nor in Buddhist theory is there a concept of “the people” nor of “civil society” nor even of democracy.’148 Furthermore, Wiarda argued, underlying cultural barriers to democracy are evident in the very languages of Asia, because he could not identify key concepts of Western democracies within many of the Asian languages. Wiarda’s bleak judgement is that the lack of such notions and understandings of essential concepts make democratisation problematic, if not impossible, in Asian cultures. We have to affirm Wiarda’s observations that, in many instances, culturally determined concepts cannot be found in a one-to-one translation in other cultures. This does not prove, however, that democracy is impeded in Asia by the languages themselves. In fact, Wiarda’s observation supports the argument put forward in this book that democracy and its related concepts have to be explored in relation to their translations which circulate not only in the West, but also beyond.

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In translation Paley has called for an anthropology of democracy that investigates democracy in its specific cultural and historical context, without simply assuming that there is any single idealised universal democracy scheme that is easily implemented across all cultures.149 It is the anthropologists’ ethnographic methods, their attention to contesting worldviews and their interlocutors’ position outside of the elite political institutions that she has recognised as that which enables the anthropologist to look beyond the political science models of democratic transition in order to understand ‘the local meanings, circulating discourses, multiple contestations, and changing forms of power’.150 How is democracy conceptualised differently in various locations, and what does democratisation mean in these different places? How can we explain or account for the multiplicity of expressions of democracy throughout the world that political scientists have had a difficult time addressing? Spurred by Paley’s call, I have chosen several lines of inquiry into Tibetan democracy in order to avoid a general and over-simplified transition theory presuming a set of sequences by which a phenomenon appears and develops. Democracy is rather investigated in its specific cultural and historical contexts, where anthropological perspectives and methods contribute to the theorisation in the context of the very notion of democracy. Moreover, similar to Paley, I argue that there is no idealised universal scheme regarding democracy that is simply implemented across all cultures. In order to unearth the many contesting translations of democracy and the idiosyncratic process of democratisation, I not only apply ethnographic methods in my approach to understanding democracy, but I also relate these methods to translation studies.151 Democracy, I argue, cannot be contained within any one definition and moved to other territories without an act of translation. Within any democratisation process, democracy is translated. Translation works both as a metaphor and as an actual analytical concept to approach the ways in which democracy is given meaning in new contexts. To ‘translate democracy’ is not the same as finding the

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linguistic equivalent to a word; instead, the definition developed in this book captures the multidimensional process of translating a political concept. Taking inspiration from Richter and Koselleck’s exposition on ‘basic political concepts’ (grundbegriffe),152 I propose that there are inescapable concepts containing abstract ideas about the world, our past, present and future. Words such as civil society, human rights, secularism, modernity, revolution, individualisation, the state and democracy encapsulate a plurality of meanings which has been crystallised into one single word, and thus has transformed the word into a political concept. By investigating the translation of democracy as a political concept, I highlight how democracy is filled with particular meanings and worldviews that enable explanations as to how and why Tibetans have organised the way they do; why democracy has been translated in particular ways; how past experiences and future expectations have been embedded into the meanings of a concept; why Tibetans have acted in certain ways; and why particular problems have developed. This applied definition of what it means to translate political concepts has been heavily inspired by a talk by Richter on the transfer and transformation of concepts that are culturally embedded and articulated in a particular language.153 Hence, I explore the Tibetan exiles’ translation of democracy as ongoing negotiations of a political concept which has a life story; which produces (unforeseen) consequences; which is deployed by various agents of different power; and which results in multiple translations in the form of structures, institutions, practice, discourse, language, culture, acts, and so forth. This definition of translation emphasises the complex and multidimensional process that translation is. Translation is more than simply the translingual act of ‘bringing across’ meaning from a source text written in one language into another target language.154 The literary translator Weinberger gave one stunning example from poetry, explaining: The purpose of, say, a poetry translation is [. . .] to allow the poem to be heard in the translation-language, ideally in many of the same ways it is heard in the original language. This means

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that a translation is a whole work; it is not a series of matching en face lines and shouldn’t be read as such. It means that the primary task of a translator is not merely to get the dictionary meanings right – which is the easiest part – but rather to invent a new music for the text in the translation-language, one that is mandated by the original. A music that is not a technical replication of the original [. . .]. A music that is perfectly viable in English, but which – because it is a translation, because it will be read as a translation – is able to evoke another music, and perhaps reproduce some of its effects.155 The purpose, then, is for the translation to be heard and the new music, authorised by the original, is invented. Furthermore, wordfor-word translation which sounds meaningless in the target language is no translation at all. Translating is also a transcultural and intercultural act that, in the words of Brodzki ‘involves the transfer of a narrative or text from one signifying form to another, the transporting of texts from one historical context to another, and the tracking of the migration of meanings from one cultural space to another’.156 Or, as informed by Howland in a general context, translation involves conceptual transfers, not of words only, but of ideas that in the process of translation transcode cultural material.157 It may even be useful to talk about ‘cultural translation’158 in the sense that translations of democracy and their manifestations in institutions, procedures, political cultures and discourses necessarily take different forms in different societies, not only because acts of translation are taking place in specific historical and political contexts, but also because imaginations regarding democracy are both bound and enabled by culture, politics, social order, and so forth. Thus, translating foreign concepts such as democracy poses tremendous challenges, not only in pinpointing what the original word ‘democracy’ might mean, but also in identifying and translating what it might refer to in another language. The key to translation, hence, is not to reduce the cultural premises that are infused in the concept, but at the same time transform the concept into a language that makes sense in the new setting.

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Let me give a few examples of the problems of translation. In most of the chapters in this book, the Tibetan concept of chos is involved in the processes of translating the various key understandings of the democracy concept and point towards why it is more useful to talk about ‘competing translations’ rather than about ‘the vernacularization of democracy’ as a phenomenon applicable amongst Tibetans. Simply translating chos into ‘religion’ or ‘Buddhism’ is problematic without careful reflection. When Tibetan exiles talk about chos, it has several possible connotations depending on its context, for instance ‘morality’, ‘ethics’, ‘duty’ and ‘doctrine’. It can also be understood as ‘conduct according to rules’ or ‘ethics’ in the sense of abandoning harmful acts and their harmful intentions, which, doctrinally speaking, is the essence of the pra¯timokSa vows as explained by ˙ Sobisch.159 Chos can also be rendered as ‘spiritual law’ or ‘law’ in the sense of how things really are in their nature as realised by the Buddha. Can we call these possible translations ‘religion’, as that term is mostly understood as referring to the world’s monotheistic religions? Tibetans usually see chos as Buddhism, and only a handful of my interviewees included Islam (kha che’i chos) and Christianity (ye shu’i chos) in their explanation of chos. The politically correct and official interpretation of chos refers to the four Buddhist lineages of Tibet in addition to Bon, the so-called indigenous religion of Tibet. Additionally, the Jonang tradition has been recognised by the CTA as the fifth tradition of Tibetan Buddhism.160 In view of the difficulty of representing the concept of chos with a single term in English, it is not surprising that many resolve to simply replace chos with its Sanskrit original dharma. For these reasons, I most often prefer not to translate chos, or I say ‘religion’ or ‘Buddhism’ when these terms are appropriate. Thus, it is important to investigate how people seek to find proper words in their own cultures to describe democracy, and how they accommodate novel understandings by finding new meaning in old terms, coin new terms or instil loanwords. It is necessary, futhermore, to map the various linguistic counterparts of the notion of ‘democracy’ and other key concepts to be analysed ethnosemantically. How are they filled with their own cultural meaning? What

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meanings do these concepts amass in the local settings? And how are they used? Schaffer has, in his book Democracy in Translation, studied the ideal of democracy using such a language-centred approach that he calls ‘conceptual analysis’ as a method for identifying and comparing the meanings of concepts across languages.161 More specifically, it looks into the concept of democracy’s structure, employment in various contexts, relations to other concepts and transformation of meaning, along with other issues that arise in translating democracy.162 Through conceptual analysis, Schaffer aims at a comparison of the range of ideals upon which electoral institutions are oriented in different societies, and, using Senegal as a case study, he looks into the complex situation in which people speak many different languages which complicates an investigation into an unambiguous ‘Senegalese concept of democracy’. His investigation into people’s ordinary and political uses of the concept of democracy reveals that there is not one concept of democracy, but many. Schaffer makes this point when he writes: Xhosa speakers today talk of idemokrasi, Chinese students demonstrated for minzhu, and Vaclav Havel attempted to institute demokracie. These examples are hardly trivial. Translating minzhu, demokracie, or idemokrasi by ‘democracy,’ as journalists and scholars regularly do, is potentially problematic because the cultural premises that infuse American practices and institutions may not be universal.163 In his comparative study of the meaning of democracy, Schaffer reveals the many ways in which a single concept of democracy is not able to encapsulate the multiple meanings along with the ambiguity, ambivalence and contestation that accompanies the translation of democracy. Furthermore, also exemplified in the work of Schaffer, the process of translating democracy involves more than just identifying linguistic equivalents. We may even say that it is naive to believe in any same-ness when it comes to translation. In fact, and this is one of the main points forwarded in this book, translation always and necessarily involves a process of metamorphosis. When democracy is

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translated, it is transformed into something new. Thus, translation is more than a ‘reproduction’ or ‘transfer’ of meaning, which is a dominant, albeit narrow, sense of the word;164 it more closely resembles the Tibetan word for ‘translation’, bsgyur ba, which denotes ‘transformation’. That is to say, that although something might be lost with translation, something is also gained.165 The process of translating democracy, therefore, involves a transformation that cannot adequately be explained as the adding of culturally specific dimensions to a universal concept; it is a complete transformation. Brodzki captured the transformation involved in the act of translation when she writes, ‘In the process of being transferred from one realm or condition to another, the source event or idea is necessarily reconfigured; the result of translation is that the original, also inaccessible, is no longer an original per se; it is a pretext whose identity has been redefined.’166 Tibetans might refer to an original that they call liberal democracy, but they understand their translation of democracy to be something that is both a liberal democracy and at the same time a Tibetan democracy. Furthermore, the perspective of translation invites a multimodal investigation into a multi-layered process that helps to identify and deal with the complex issues at hand.167 While the first layer concerns language, as exemplified in the discussion above, the other layers include institutions, practice, discourse, language, culture, praxis, and so forth. My own definition of what it means to ‘translate democracy’ attempts to capture this multidimensionality, in that I recognise translation as a process taking place on different levels of society, in different domains, and manifest in institutions, political culture, etc. In this particular book, the multidimensionality of translation manifests as an institutional history, a history of transforming concepts and norms, and as played out and negotiated in the daily lives of Tibetan exiles and how they organise. We see how democracy and democratisation is particularly tricky as well as critical to translate. In fact, to translate – especially in a politically sensitive setting like the exileTibetan case – is a complicated process. For Tibetan translators of democracy, be it the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, politicians, intellectuals

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or activists, it is a complicated challenge to embark on the road to democracy while being in exile, as well as to employ a discourse of democracy that has international resonance alongside attempts to translate and construct democracy in a culturally sensitive way which safeguards loyalty and national unity under the exile leadership. Finally, the last point regarding the definition of translation that I employ throughout this book is that translation is the open-ended process of ongoing negotiations of a political concept which are deployed by various agents of different positions of power and results in multiple translations. Consequently, the political concept gains a life of its own, so to speak. I owe this positioning to Benjamin’s 1923 essay ‘The Task of the Translator’ in which he explains the afterlife of translations: how translation ensures the survival of a text or a narrative.168 Translation redeems the text enabling it to live on outside the control of the author and in a transformed form, even improved and adapted in the new life it has gained.169 Instead of making the translator invisible in this process, which has been the long-surviving ideal of translation,170 Benjamin highlighted the role of the translator who bears the responsibility of the afterlife of a text embedded in a new setting, or in our case, a political concept translated by many translators in a conflict-ridden and politically charged setting. The act of translating democracy performed by the Dalai Lama is what enables the concept of democracy to live on in a Tibetan cultural sphere in India. This act of translation allows the concept of democracy to go beyond ‘the original’ that has ceased to exist (if it ever did exist at all), and whenever other Tibetans in India take it upon themselves to translate democracy or translate what the Dalai Lama has said about democracy, they also take part in ensuring the survival of democracy ‘the Tibetan way’. Tibetan translations Although the CTA should be a continuation of governance in pre1951 Tibet, its composition does not replicate the historical Lhasa government that overall was an undemocratic elite rule under the aristocracy and the clergy, in which government monk officials and

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lay officials shared offices and administered religious and political affairs.171 In fact, a process of democratisation has been underway in exile from the very beginning. The Tibetan polity has been transforming from undemocratic elite rule to democratic polity through a process of democratisation, which includes: the introduction in 1963 of a constitution for a future democratic Tibet;172 a charter for governance-in-exile which was initiated in 1991;173 as well as later amendments to the charter, especially in 2011. Furthermore, hereditary titles and the allocation of reserved seats for lay and monk officials in government offices have been abolished; the people are educated in order to create a democratic mind-set amongst Tibetans whom also now democratically elect their representatives; the parliament has come to power and influence; the political dominance by the Gelug school (one sect of Tibetan Buddhism) has ended; and there is now a clear separation of legislative, executive, and judiciary powers in the CTA by the institutions of the Supreme Justice Commission (ches mtho’i khrims zhib khang), the Tibetan parliament-in-exile (bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs), and the Council (bka’ shag) heading the seven departments for religion and culture, home, education, finance, security, health, and information and international relations.174 Concurrent with this explicit process of democratisation, the exile leadership has felt the need to ensure that their institutions, procedures and political culture remains essentially Tibetan so that they retain their identity as a continuation of the pre-1951 ‘Tibetan ways’. For example, the 44-member-strong Tibetan parliament-inexile has adopted a religion– region template reflecting the definition of Tibet and its demos by allotting seats in the parliament to people according to religious observance and geographical origin, thereby recognising both the prominence of religion within Tibetan governance and the defining territorial and regional boundaries of Tibet.175 More specifically, the template stipulates that ten seats in the parliament are to be reserved for two representatives from each of the five religious traditions recognised as Tibetan, namely the socalled indigenous religion Bon and the four major Buddhist traditions: Nyingma, Kagyu, Sakya and Gelug.176 Another 30 seats

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are allocated to ten delegates from each of the three Tibetan provinces; only four seats are reserved for exile constituencies with two delegates residing in North America; and two in Europe (regardless of their regional and religious affiliation). Ideally, the quota system should ensure that the members of parliament mirror the composition of the Tibetan population, whether they reside in exile or in Tibet. Until the elections in 2006, the Dalai Lama also appointed one to three additional delegates, but this stipulation has since been removed from the charter. The Fourteenth Dalai Lama, who is viewed by Tibetan exiles as the architect of Tibetan democracy, has stated that he had already thought about reforms in line with democratic values before going into exile, and that he also finds Buddhism to be compatible with democracy.177 Apart from such official explanations for initiating a democratisation process upon arrival in India, one must also consider that having a democratic system in exile can provide an efficient system for legitimate succession of political leadership with more longevity and stability than the institution of reincarnated Dalai Lamas. At the same time, the exile leadership can be said to have accommodated the dominant discourse of democracy promoted in the international community, thus employing an important means for generating support and obtaining diplomatic recognition. The move towards democracy proved, among other things, the exile leadership’s willingness to negotiate with the world community on its terms by using the language of a universalistic discourse of democracy. At the same time, it has also proved Tibetan exiles to be serious contenders to state power, thus substantiating the democratic intent of the exile elite that has not only moved away from a societal structure that has been deemed feudal, but also away from traditional governance deemed theocratic. Furthermore, claiming to be in democratic transition can also serve as an ideological weapon contesting the legitimacy of Chinese rule in Tibet, which Tibetan exiles view as undemocratic and illegal. We can presume that democracy in this state-like polity developed by Tibetans outside of a nation state has taken a particular form that Tibetans understand to be especially suited to their specific exile

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circumstances. However, as reflected in the central thesis of this book, democracy has been translated differently by different people, yet who are perceived to be a people who share the same history, culture, and language. Thus, the Tibetan democratisation process challenges general and over-simplified transition theories that presume a set of sequences by which a phenomenon appears and develops. Democracy has thus taken multiple forms as it travels around the globe – it is translated in multiple ways. Since democracy is a political and social construct co-authored and contested by Tibetan exiles themselves, it is indispensable to listen to Tibetans expressing themselves in Tibetan to other Tibetans, spoken or written, in order to understand how they represent themselves and negotiate their understandings of the world in relation to the many limitations and possibilities that constitute exile.178 The result of this process is that democracy among Tibetan exiles in India has been translated into an enchanted gift that in turn restricts the way Tibetans approach democracy.

The gift When referring to democracy as a gift, a gift in Tibetan society in general can include many things: material items, protection, alms, friendship, advice, ceremonial scarves, donations for religious service and bribes. They can be ritual gifts given, for example, at weddings, and symbolic gifts, such as the ritual sacrifice of one’s body. Even spiritual merit obtained from engaging in beneficial acts can be given and transferred to others. The best gift, however, is the one bestowed without expecting a return. As one of the six perfections, generosity – da¯na in Sanskrit and sbyin pa in Tibetan – is the first perfection. Generosity, as stated in the prajn˜apa¯ramita¯ literature, is to give fully without attachment and without expecting any reward. On one level, it is also to give skilfully, i.e. to reflect on when to give, what to give, how to give and why one is giving.179 Democracy has also become such a gift given out of the generosity and wisdom of the Dalai Lama – a practitioner of da¯na. An 80-year-old retired soldier in Bylakuppe, Pema Tseten, related this to me:

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I think democracy is extraordinarily good [dpe mi srid pa yag po ]! Democracy was a gift [gsol ras ] the Dalai Lama gave. Honestly, I think it really has incredibly great value [dpe ma srid pa rtsa chen po ]!180 The predominant discourse among exile Tibetans claims that democracy has been offered as a gift to the people by the Dalai Lama. This understanding of democracy as a gift was endlessly repeated and reproduced during my many conversations with Tibetans in Dharamsala and in the settlements in the north and south of India. In fact, most Tibetan exiles echoed the notion of democracy as a precious gift, and some even said that the Dalai Lama blessed them with democracy. Choegon Rinpoche, a highly esteemed 38-year-old Buddhist teacher in Clement Town, mentioned the gift during our conversation on religion and politics in Tibet. He explained: His Holiness the Dalai Lama gave us this gift of liberal democracy [mang gtso rang dbang gnang ba ‘di ]. We did not get the Dalai Lama’s gift [skyabs mgon gi gnang ba ] a few years ago. He gave it around the 1960s, immediately after coming here to exile in India. We say that we were given the gift of democracy [mang gtso’i gsol ras gnang ba ].181 Others similarly say that democracy is ‘the Dalai Lama’s gift’ (skyabs mgon gi gnang ba), and call democracy ‘the gift of democracy’ (mang gtso’i gsol ras gnang pa) or ‘the gift of liberal democracy’ (rang dbang mang gtso gnang ba). It is noteworthy that in the Dalai Lama’s speeches since 1959, I have never come across any instances when he has said that he has given Tibetans democracy, and I do not know from where or when the narrative of the gift of democracy originated. Nevertheless, this narrative relating how democracy has been given as a gift from the Dalai Lama, the gift was passed on to Tibetans in several ways: by talking about it to his people, to the organisations and to the CTA; by suggesting and initiating institutional and procedural changes; by educating the leaders about democracy; and by transferring his political powers to the people. This gift of

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democracy is what I call an ‘enchanted gift’ – a gift imbued with the divinity of its donor, the Dalai Lama. Though probably not initially intended by the Dalai Lama to be a gift, the gift status of democracy has added to the complexity of translating and constructing democracy in exile. Furthermore, this understanding of democracy as a gift, I argue, has had considerable consequences for democratising the Tibetan exiles’ organisation and life in India. Considering democracy to be a gift that has been exchanged, moreover, aids in illuminating the multiplicity and multivocality of democracy. In the following section, I explore how the literature on gift exchange in other cultures might aid the investigation into the nature of this particular gift of democracy.182 I highlight how the relationship between donor and gift has made democracy an enchanted gift, and then look at how the enchanted gift strengthens the relationship between donor and recipient by binding the recipients in an obligation. What does it mean to say that a gift is enchanted? And in which ways does such a gift emancipate and restrict its recipients? What is the significance in giving, receiving and reciprocating this gift? Gifts and donors The relationship between the donor and the gift has considerable consequences for the act of receiving and reciprocating, as has been elucidated in discussions on whether or not there can be free gifts. In this connection, it has been argued that when the relationship between donor and gift is one of inalienability, then a gift is never free. These discussions will be introduced in the following and have theoretical relevance to the enchanted gift of democracy for two reasons. First of all, I will establish that the gift of democracy is not a free gift. Secondly, the relationship between the Dalai Lama and democracy, I argue, in some ways resembles that of inalienability. Nonetheless, the concept of the enchanted gift, I argue, is more appropriate in analysing the nature of the gift of democracy in the Tibetan exile. Before I explain why, I shall briefly introduce the discussion on free gifts and inalienability.

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Malinowski explained the ‘pure’ gift as a gift given out of complete altruism without pursuing personal interest – nothing is expected in return.183 Although he later retracted the notion of pure gifts,184 others have pursued the idea of a pure or free gift. Parry, for example, argued that free gifts do exist and presented ‘the Indian gift’, i.e. alms giving within Hindu law, as an example.185 He explained that a gift is free when there is an absolute separation between the donor and the gift. That is to say, that the gift is not imbued with the donor, and that the gift does not create personal bonds between the donor and the recipient. In short, the gift is free in the sense that it is non-reciprocal. This description, however, does not fit the enchanted gift of democracy within the Tibetan exile. Other scholars have argued against the existence of free gifts. There is no such thing as a free gift, Douglas established in her foreword to Mauss’s seminal work, The Gift.186 The free gift does not exist, because all gifts are morally sanctioned. In the way in which Mauss has discussed the gift, there can be no absolute disjunction between donor and gift; therefore, it is neither pure nor free, but inalienable. The Maussian gift is an inalienable gift, because there is an enduring, spiritual bond between the donor and the gift. The inalienability of the gift entails three key elements: (1) The donor participates in the gift, in the sense that the donor’s spirit or personality is in the gift; (2) The donor keeps a lien on the gift, meaning, in Weiner’s thesis, there is a ‘keeping while giving’, i.e. the gift is given with attached conditions, and thus, it is never really given away; (3) In effect, the inalienable gift binds donor and recipient in a relationship.187 The concept of inalienability implies that the donor keeps the propriety rights for the gift, i.e. the donors’ claim on the gift does not end with the recipient receiving it. This aspect of inalienability is one reason why the concept of the inalienable gift does not apply to the enchanted gift of democracy. The Dalai Lama cannot take the gift back; it has been given forever. The gift of democracy, nonetheless, appears to be closely identified with its donor. In that sense, it is a Maussian gift or an inalienable gift. Democracy, as a gift from the Dalai Lama, was created by him, touched by him and taught by him.

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I have furthermore considered democracy to be an enchanted gift: a gift embodied with the divinity of the Dalai Lama. As such, the Dalai Lama has imbued the gift throughout the life trajectories of democracy, and it is doubtful if there have been instances when the gift of democracy was not identified with its donor. Democracy has remained a gift from the Dalai Lama regardless of its shifting meanings, its new locations, its diverse recipients. Thus, the connection between the gift and its donor has been enduring. Being enchanted also means that, although the Dalai Lama has tried to release or alienate himself from the gift as will be further illuminated in Chapter 1, it seems that the recipients are never released from the gift. When the gift of democracy was passed from the Dalai Lama to the people, and when it entered new domains and geographic sites, the gift was in some cases never unwrapped and explored, tested, appraised or embedded into everyday life because of its enchantment. An illuminating allegory was made by Pema Thinley, the editor of the Tibetan Review, who in several articles has argued against the misnomer of ‘gifted democracy’.188 He has appealed to the Tibetans to unwrap the gift of democracy, ‘to see what is in it for all of us’, instead of perceiving the gift as sacred and respectfully place the unopened gift ‘on the altar in its undisturbed sanctity’.189 The enchantment of the gift has become evident through the way in which these Tibetans do not question the gift or evaluate it according to what they themselves would like. It resembles the fetishism that Laidlaw, albeit in a different context, has recognised in gifts believed to be imbued with the soul of the donor.190 It would, however, be imprecise to regard the Dalai Lama’s gift as sacred in every context that it has entered. Godelier has explained how the sacred form that objects can take may idealise and transform the object into representing the common good, the law or the principle that cannot be contested or opposed.191 Godelier, in perpetuating Weiner’s discussion on objects that are kept out of gift exchange,192 has argued that sacred objects are not given, but kept. Those who keep these sacred objects obtain the special powers endowing the sacred object. Though this image of the sacred gift is

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compelling, it does not exactly fit the gift of democracy. The powers of the Dalai Lama are not endowed upon the recipients, rather the acceptance of the gift ideally means that the recipients are empowering themselves and gain control over the Dalai Lama’s political powers; nonetheless, the Dalai Lama remains in control since it is his gift to give. In a certain manner, the gift of democracy can be compared to the constitution, as Godelier has done in his discussion of the ‘disenchanted gift’.193 He has argued that the constitution remains outside transaction and explained how it is the common and inalienable property of those who have voted for it, i.e. it obtains its legitimacy from the input aspects of democracy. People endow themselves in the constitution, unlike sacred objects in which the gods are endowed. In contrast to this, Tsering Wangyal, former editor of Tibetan Review, once commented that the exile-Tibetan constitution, promulgated in 1963 by the Dalai Lama, was considered sacred by Tibetans. He explained: His obedient subjects received it in the same spirit in which they receive anything else from him or any high lama. It was regarded as a holy document, to be placed on the family altar alongside the images of deities and photographs of lamas, and to be prayed in front of every morning.194 It is interesting that some recipients have treated the enchanted gift as sacred and placed it unopened on the altar because they deem the donor, and hence the gift, as sacred. And it is furthermore interesting that others, who also identify the gift with the exalted wisdom and generosity of the Dalai Lama, have opened the enchanted gift, assessed it, and even suggested amendments or tried to treat it as a secular gift, as we will see in Chapter 4. All of these interlocutors have identified the gift of democracy with the Dalai Lama. Who are the recipients then, who recognise the enchantment of the gift differently? Moreover, since the gift is imbued with the donor, what is the nature of the relationship between donor and recipients? What are the implications for receiving and reciprocating the gift? I turn

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now to introduce the giving and receiving of the gift of democracy among the exile-Tibetan community in India. Donor and recipients Democracy as an enchanted gift was built upon the relationship between the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan people. Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, has an exalted position in Tibetan polity, because he is worshipped as an incarnation of the Bodhisattva Avalokites´vara. As ‘the master of religion and politics’ (chos srid gnyis kyi bdag po), the Dalai Lama is the foremost religious and political authority in Tibetan society. The bond between the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and the Tibetan people was described by 39-year-old Tenzin Lhamo, a Lhasa woman who moved to Dharamsala in order to be close to the Dalai Lama: We, all Tibetans, refer to the leader of chos [religion] and srid [politics] as His Holiness [the Fourteenth Dalai Lama], as our spiritual teacher, as our Buddha. We, six million Tibetans, refer to him as our spiritual teacher, Buddha, leader, king and head of state [. . .]. We, all the Tibetans, cannot possibly be separated from chos [the teachings of the Buddha]. The reason is that the chos was transmitted by the Bodhisattva Avalokites´vara. The Bodhisattva Avalokites´vara is the supreme leader of Tibet, our spiritual guide and Buddha, and we, all the Tibetans, can’t possibly be separated from him. The Chinese government always opposes His Holiness, saying that His Holiness is no good and that he creates miserable conditions. When they are making such accusations to the Tibetans, all Tibetan people feel great pain in their hearts. That is why [Tibetans] have sacrificed their life in Tibet recently. Generally, committing suicide is not allowed by our Tibetan chos. They are sacrificing their precious human life in order to protect chos and the culture of six million Tibetans. They sacrifice their life by pouring oil over their bodies and by putting themselves on fire. Their bodies are offered like butter lamps [mchod me nang bzhin phul ]. These acts are really tremendously hard for us.195

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The bond between the Dalai Lama and his Tibetan followers is so great, that when the Chinese are trying to corrupt it, Tibetans commit extreme acts of sacrifice and transgress the rules of their religion for the sake of their chos and culture. Tenzin Lhamo was pained, but nonetheless felt blessed that she was able to be close to the Dalai Lama in India. It is this relationship between donor and recipients that explains the immense importance of the gift of democracy. This strong bond between the Dalai Lama and his followers makes it even more interesting when taking into account the literature on gift exchange. There we can identify four general points regarding the relationship between the donor and the recipients: (1) Gifts establish, confirm and reinforce social relations and power structures; (2) The giving of gifts is a form of governance because it creates a social contract or an obligation; (3) This means that the giving of a gift demands reciprocity in the form of counterprestations; and (4) The recipients can be worthy or unworthy of gifts. The first point is that social relations are affirmed by gifts, entailing a power relation between donor and recipient. Gregory has pointed out how this dynamic of power establishes the ways in which the gift strengthens and modifies the existing relationship.196 Since democracy in the Tibetan exile has been given the status of gift by its recipients, this has strengthened the current relationship between the donor and the recipients, and Tibetans recognise the Dalai Lama’s generous act of giving democracy as having been done with exalted knowledge and affection towards them. Not only is there a relationship of unequal power, but also a relationship between a spiritual guide and devotees, a statesman and loyal subjects, and a divine reincarnation and his worshippers. Since the donor, who is a spiritual guide, a statesman and a divine being in the eyes of the recipients, has been imbued within the gift by nature of being the giver, the gift has a special status, and the acts of giving and receiving affirm this bond between the donor and the recipients. Perhaps the most fascinating detail is that while this enchanted gift of democracy affirms a relationship of unequal power, the Dalai Lama actually intended to change this relationship to the gift when he transferred

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his political powers to the recipients. Therefore, there is an intriguing ambiguity connected with the enchanted gift of democracy. In the Dalai Lama’s definition of democracy, he wanes as the Tibetans’ political leader. But in practice so far, the more the recipients of democracy accept the gift, the more they anchor the Dalai Lama as their ultimate authority. In other words, his generosity of giving democracy involves the contradiction of cementing his position as traditional authority. When the donor cannot be abstracted from the gift, and the donor has superiority over the recipient, as is the case of the enchanted gift, then the gift must necessarily carry a ‘social load’.197 That is to say that power relations and polities are carried on as the gift shifts hands. In this case, the gift has a political function. This leads to the second point, that such a gift is a means for governance, i.e. a way to coordinate social life. For Malinowski in his study on tribal economics, gift exchange was a primitive parallel to a social contract.198 The system of gifts and counter-gifts in primitive societies replaced the government or the law in the sense that gifts created social bonds and obligations. In this way, a gift has a binding force, and gift-giving is a means for governance. Similarly, the Dalai Lama presented democracy as a responsibility resting upon Tibetans, and through this they have become bound in a social contract in the manner in which they are obliged to take care of the gift. The Dalai Lama’s introduction of democracy, seen as the act of gift-giving, is furthermore mediated by institutions and enforced by middlemen from Dharamsala who play a central role in the settlements, for example in remote Bylakuppe. People can oppose the mediators who are the government officials, but not the donor, the Dalai Lama. Democracy was and is not a gift they can refuse. The third point, drawing upon the work of Le´vi-Strauss,199 is that gifts must be reciprocated by counter-prestations either by indirect reciprocity or by direct and immediate reciprocity. It is because the gift is inalienable, or in the Tibetan case enchanted, that its recipients are compelled to reciprocate. Feelings such as faithfulness and gratitude sustain reciprocity in relations, but while faithfulness is the powerful tool of loyalty establishing social cohesion, gratitude

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motivates the actual act of reciprocating.200 When Tibetans, even those who did not appreciate the gift or did not think they needed the gift, nevertheless felt obliged to give something in return, it is because of their loyalty to the Dalai Lama. It is a personified loyalty to the Dalai Lama, since he unifies and symbolises the Tibetan nation. Loyalty to the cause, the CTA, the charter, etc., are equated with loyalty to the Dalai Lama.201 Although gift exchanges ideally are balanced in the long term, the quid pro quo does not mean that what is given is the same as what is reciprocated. Reciprocal relations entail that the giver and recipient are compensated with ‘counterprestations of a different nature’.202 A counter-prestation in the exileTibetan context is to perpetuate democracy and participate in democratic procedures. Though the Dalai Lama might not have expected anything in return for himself personally, he had expected that democracy eventually would be accepted and implemented in the CTA, the settlements and the organisations, as related in Chapters 1, 2 and 3 respectively. Not being able to reciprocate or to make a counter-prestation has the potential to debase the recipients. Hence, the fourth point regarding gift-giving and receiving reminds us that recipients can be evaluated according to their ability to reciprocate and the quality of counter-prestation. Recipients of the enchanted gift of democracy in the Tibetan exile community have been evaluated by fellow exiles and have not always been found worthy, especially when they are not considered to be politically enlightened. This is the most commonly voiced example of obstacles to the democratisation process in the Tibetan exile society. It is presented as an agreed-upon fact that, on the whole, ordinary Tibetans are unworthy of the gift because they do not understand it. This was also the opinion of farmer Dorje Phuntsok in Bylakuppe. A very outspoken person, an advocate of democracy and a critic of both the CTA and his peers, Dorje Phuntsok looked up to the Dalai Lama as a progressive and generous leader, but criticised the people for lacking the ability to understand the meaning of the blessing they received from the Dalai Lama. In one of our conversations in 2007, Dorje Phuntsok exclaimed:

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His Holiness has given a democracy, but people don’t know what the meaning of democracy is [. . .] In every field, he came with heart and tried to teach us, you know. So this is what I’m saying: Blessed are the Tibetan people.203 The perception of democracy as a gift has bound the Tibetans to the democratisation project initiated by the Dalai Lama and the CTA in a social contract. In this way, we can say that it has facilitated the implementation of democracy, because Tibetans have been more prone to accept it. Concurrently, the gift status of democracy has also added problems for the Tibetan exiles. While reproducing the image of the gift in their statements regarding democracy, the actions of some Tibetans challenge this very same top-down democratisation. These Tibetans have contested, circumvented and even rejected democracy. Thus, I argue, the very same enchantment that has made many Tibetans accept democracy in the first place has concurrently caused ambiguity regarding democracy. Therefore, I argue, when we investigate the definitions of the gift of democracy, we also have to look for the symbolic meaning of the gift and identify its constraining qualities that limit interpretations and dealings with it. In what respects is the definition broad enough and able to provide freedom in imagining and dealing with the gift? When is the gift of democracy perceived as restricting, and when is it emancipating? When the gift enters a new life phase, a domain of society or a geographical site, in what ways does it change character, and in what ways does it remain stable? Can it, for example, at certain times be a sacred blessing and at other times a commodity or even a burden? And as for relations, what does the gift do to the bond between the donor and the recipient? Are there circumstances under which the donor is abstracted from his gift, i.e. when the gift becomes disenchanted? Which counter-prestations are expected in return, and why and when does such an expectation occur? What are good recipients, and what are poor recipients? Are some people excluded from being recipients? Under which circumstances can the gift considered to be unreciprocated? All of these questions will be addressed throughout the course of this book, which as a whole

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illuminates how the enchanted gift of democracy has been appropriated within a Tibetan exile context.

Outline of the book Scholarly works have taken various approaches to discussing the freedom movement in exile, some of which also enter discussions of democracy and democratisation. Ann Frechette’s excellent monograph, Tibetans in Nepal: The Dynamics of International Assistance among a Community in Exile (2002), focuses on the tensions between Tibetans in Nepal, their patrons, and the CTA. Jane Ardley’s The Tibetan Independence Movement: Political, Religious and Gandhian Perspectives (2002) delves into the methods and goals of the Tibetan exiles, comparing the exile-Tibetan movement with the Gandhian struggle for India’s independence. Two books present the institutional history of the Tibetan government-in-exile: Stephanie Roemer’s The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large (2008), which from a political science viewpoint focuses on the multiple stakeholders and agents in which the exile-Tibetan movement is dependent upon; and Helen R. Boyd’s The Future of Tibet: The Government-in-Exile Meets the Challenge of Democratization (2004), which is exclusively based upon English-language sources and searches for similarities between Buddhism and democracy. The present book deviates from those works in that it explores democracy as an open-ended and ongoing, multi-layered process of translation, taking into account how the concept of democracy may have several life paths, and that its trajectories may alter dramatically.204 In the life trajectories of the concept of democracy, I argue that it is necessarily transformed by the people who imagine, appropriate and use it. Hence, the approach presented in this book seeks to reveal the relationships between concepts and people by examining how the concept of democracy has been understood from various viewpoints. I have tracked its institutional history and enquired into how it is spoken by a model citizen, i.e. a Tibetan living in a settlement area; examined how a particular group fights for ownership over it; and disentangled the frictions that have been created when the concept was being

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negotiated by claimants. It is within these various contexts that the concept of democracy has been composed, and by reconstructing these life trajectories I have attempted to write the rich and complex life story of democracy using a method of ‘thick description’.205 The book is divided into two parts. The first part of the book consists of three chapters that address the life story of democracy in terms of its relationships as it enters new life phases, new domains of society and changes hands at different geographical sites. Chapter 1 unfolds its conceptual history as spoken by the Dalai Lama and its institutional history in the CTA that together constitute a normative domain. It is a chronological historical narrative, while the subsequent two chapters focus directly on the multiple relations that make up its identity and the main tensions enveloping it. Chapter 2 presents democracy in the very local domain constituting the settlements and scattered communities in India, and Chapter 3 presents the civil society domain constituting exile-Tibetan organisations and groups. The second part of the book focuses on three prominent tensions and negotiations enveloping the life of democracy, namely the double-bind of politics and religion in Chapter 4, the friction around traditional authority and democratic legitimacy in Chapter 5 and, finally, issues positioning the freedom fight in contrast to democracy in Chapter 6. Cutting across all chapters is the central argument permeating this book, namely that while democracy unavoidably is translated by us and by others, Tibetan translations of democracy have transformed democracy into an enchanted gift.

CHAPTER 1 THE DALAI LAMA AND AUTHORITATIVE SPEECH

Democracy has always been closely associated with Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, who has an exalted spiritual role for those who recognise and worship him as an incarnation of the Bodhisattva Avalokites´vara. Several Tibetans have described this devotion and the trust that fellow exiles place on the Dalai Lama as ‘blind faith’. Dorje Phuntsok, a 54-year-old farmer in Bylakuppe with whom I had several discussions in 2007, viewed this blind faith as essentially based on fair trust in the Dalai Lama: It’s something like blind faith. They had heard about His Holiness: ‘He is great! Great! He’s our king. He’s our political leader. He’s a reincarnation of Avalokites´vara,’ [they say] like that. Now, when His Holiness came to India, everybody thinks that the old Tibetan government is here [. . .] His Holiness is here so everybody puts the responsibility to his head [i.e. on his shoulders]. And His Holiness is not like other leaders elsewhere. We, the Tibetans, have trusted him, and he has worked honestly and sincerely for the freedom of Tibetans.1 The Tibetans’ devotion and trust in the Dalai Lama has not only been based upon the powers and wisdom associated with being one of the

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most important authorities within Tibetan Buddhism, but, as is also indicated in the above statement, has been further dispersed into their trust in his political leadership, to the extent that many Tibetans rely on his political advice and decisions. Traditionally, the Dalai Lama is the ‘the master of religion and politics’ (chos srid gnyis kyi bdag po).2 He holds both political and religious authority in Tibetan society as well as political offices in the government, which have continued in the democratic set-up in India, albeit in a different form, where until recently he was the non-elected leader of state and government. The stay in exile has increased the Tibetans’ trust in the Dalai Lama as a political leader due to the new political experiences he has faced. Another Tibetan lama, 38-year-old Choegon Rinpoche in Clement Town, once explained to me that the Dalai Lama, as a political leader contemporary to China’s Mao and India’s Nehru, has experienced and understood modern politics – be it communism or democracy: Now, there is really no need to discuss the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, his amazing work. To say it in a nutshell: I think the Fourteenth Dalai Lama is extremely good. He was a contemporary of Chairman Mao, and he was there at the time of Jawaharlal Nehru. These two men were the most important of their time in Asia [. . .] His Holiness knew and met Mao Zedong and from that experience he knows well what communism is. Likewise, at that time he met and knew Jawaharlal Nehru, so there is no need to say how much he knows about democracy.3 The Fourteenth Dalai Lama had assumed full powers as the leader of chos srid at the age of only 16 when he was enthroned at the Potala Palace on 17 November 1950, only a month after People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops had invaded East Tibet and taken control over Chamdo.4 The Dalai Lama’s abilities as a statesman was soon put to test, especially after his escape to India when he had to prove that he was a capable leader and able to retain his authority of a people displaced both physically (Tibetans in exile) and culturally (Tibetans in

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Tibet). In his leadership, democracy became a central pillar within the discourse of the Dalai Lama’s and the Central Tibetan Administration’s (CTA) struggle for a free Tibet. With the introduction of the concept of democracy within this discourse, Tibetan exiles have responded that if they could vote for the Dalai Lama, they would. Most Tibetans see him as the very architect of their democracy, as a true upholder of democratic values and as the most democratic leader the Tibetans could have. The Dalai Lama has spoken about democracy since the beginning of his exile in 1959. In his speeches, he has conveyed a particular knowledge of democracy to his Tibetan audience, and the Tibetans, on their side, have tapped into his discourse on democracy to explain exile organisation and life, as well as to legitimise democratic reforms. The ways through which the Dalai Lama has presented democracy to Tibetans have had a great impact on how Tibetan exiles have translated democracy. In this context it is important to understand that when the Dalai Lama offers his visions in speeches to a Tibetan public, his words often serve as political guidelines for the Tibetan people’s freedom struggle, and his speeches are often indicative of the CTA’s current policies. In fact, the Dalai Lama’s speeches guide the CTA in how democracy is manifested in the form of policies, institutions and practices. This capacity to steer Tibetan exile society is what I refer to as ‘governance’. The Dalai Lama’s speeches guide, shape, correct, modify and influence the Tibetans’ ways of organising the world and their norms of conduct by influencing them to align themselves according to the metaphor of democracy as a gift. In this regard, there are obvious similarities between the characteristics of governance through authoritative speech, and the governance described by Shore and Wright in their exploration of policy worlds. Like policies, authoritative political speech creates new social and semantic terrains, new political subjects and relations, and not least new webs of meaning by bringing together culture and society in new alignments.5 Whereas the author of a policy is usually invisible, the words about democracy uttered with the authority of the Dalai Lama constitute a source for legitimacy – not only for the words

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themselves, but also for the meanings, policies, institutions, and so forth, which have forged an origination in his speeches. Moreover, the way that the world is classified and organised in the Dalai Lama’s speeches, i.e. how he defines and explains democracy, also has a ‘runaway effect’6 in that it actively reshapes the terrains in which it is introduced, creating a life of its own. Thus, it is not only the Dalai Lama who is translating democracy – Tibetans also take it upon themselves to interpret what democracy is. This means that although it is true that his speeches motivate agency and make people modify and reform their behaviour as responsible citizens within a context of democracy, it does not mean that all acts by Tibetans are determined by instructions that they have received from the Dalai Lama’s speeches. And it certainly does not mean that what the Dalai Lama says mirrors what Tibetans do. Norms and actions are not necessarily in accordance with one another, and throughout the chapters of this book we see how, although the Dalai Lama’s words are seen as authoritative by the majority of Tibetans, the very same norms played out in exile-Tibetan organisations and settlements demonstrate contradicting imaginations and practices of democracy. Nonetheless, it is clear that in many cases, the Tibetans inform themselves and even explain and legitimise their acts by referring to the Dalai Lama. In view of the Dalai Lama’s authority to govern through speech acts, the purpose of this chapter is to recover the concept of democracy as spoken by the head of state and government, the Dalai Lama, on the one hand, and as institutionalised in the CTA, on the other hand. Ideally, these two institutions comprise a normative domain towards which Tibetans inform themselves of the meaning of democracy. Thus, this chapter tells the normative biography of the democracy concept when owned by a role model and unfolds its life story in a chronological narrative: starting with the Dalai Lama’s entry in exile into the world’s largest democracy, India; how democracy developed over three phases of its life; and ending with the Dalai Lama stepping down from political office. A total of 490 Tibetan-language speeches made by the Dalai Lama constitute the main source for the empirical data analysed in this chapter.7 The Dalai Lama has delivered these speeches on special

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occasions which include: Uprising Day, Democracy Day, the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize and Human Rights Day, teachings to devotees, and the regular meetings that he holds with the parliament, the cabinet, ‘new-arrivals’, pilgrims, civil society, and so forth. His speeches to Tibetans are aired on radio and cable TV, and they are transcribed and published in flyers, newsletters, magazines and newspapers. His speeches have also been collected and ordered according to topics, arranged in chronological order in rows of many book volumes published by the DIIR, and excerpts of these talks have been reorganised into new collages presented as words of wisdom on selected topics such as gender, compassion, education and democracy. From these speeches we can map the life story of the Dalai Lama’s translation of democracy.8 It is the translations of democracy conveyed in his speeches that enter other domains of society and other geographical sites where it is received, translated and negotiated by Tibetan exiles. Throughout the following, we shall learn of the transformations that the concept of democracy has undergone within the exileTibetan context since 1959 and see how ‘democracy’ in 1959 is not the same as ‘democracy’ half a decade later. Furthermore, the Tibetan term for ‘democracy’ assumed two different translations in Tibetan: dmangs gtso and mang gtso. The first translation is less common in the transcripts after 1992, because the CTA tried to standardise the translation as mang gtso. This alteration in translation, while seemingly slight, is significant. Furthermore, the way in which the Dalai Lama has articulated the concept of democracy has changed character, i.e. there were ruptures in his discourse. These ruptures which appeared in 1963, 1988 and 1998 mark the years when the regularity of the discourse changed pronouncely and new tendencies became apparent. These changes mark the beginning of new phases in the life story of how the Dalai Lama has conceptualised democracy: in 1963, the Dalai Lama promulgated the constitution that defined Tibetan polity as democratic; in 1988, the tenth parliament-in-exile convened and it was the last parliament before extensive democratic reforms; and in 1998, the Dalai Lama pressed the twelfth parliament to diminish

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his political power and responsibility so that he could ‘semi-retire’. Comparisons of these three phases show stability and transformations in the ways in which the Dalai Lama has talked about democracy since 1959, as summarised in Table 1.1. This life story presents not only new insights into the history of Tibetan democratisation, but also contextualises contemporary exileTibetan understandings of democracy. We shall see how the Dalai Lama has explained democracy as a process in the sense that Tibetan exiles were walking along a path leading to democracy in future Tibet. He consistently saw the scope for further democratic reforms in order to complete the essentials he felt were necessary for democracy in order to make it genuine. Furthermore, the Dalai Lama stressed the need for democracy and assured his audience that it was interlinked with Buddhism and the Tibetan past. While Tibetan exiles accumulated experiences of democracy, he increasingly demarcated the components of liberal democracy and pushed the issue of transferring more responsibility and power from himself to the people. Democracy, the Dalai Lama concluded, was the responsibility of the people.

On the path of democracy (1963) The institutional framework for establishing democracy in exile is, according to Dalai Lama and the CTA, the Ganden Phodrang – the Tibetan government ruling from Lhasa before its incorporation into the PRC and now temporarily residing in exile. The CTA has always portrayed itself as the continuation of the Ganden Phodrang government of pre-exile times, while at the same time adapting and updating its organisation according to its state of exile. Examples of the CTA’s transformation can be interpreted as a process of democratisation, and the first step towards this appeared at the beginning of the 1960s and included the abolishment in 1965 of hereditary titles and the division of lay officials and monk officials in government offices.9 The Ganden Phodrang, which had been reincarnated in exile as Btsan byol bod gzhung (the ‘Tibetan government-in-exile’), had four ministers deciding and

Democracy characterises: † government, system, procedure, practice

What to do in exile: † walk the path of democracy † understand, practise, and implement democracy

†

†

†

† †

government, system, procedure, practice changes, reforms

walk the path of democracy practise, implement, strengthen, and consolidate democracy accumulate experience

Topics: † constitution † constitution and charter † democracy in a future free Tibet † democratic reforms in a future free Tibet, exile, China, and in the world † break with past mistakes, † elections adapt to the present † no political position for the Dalai Lama

Phase 2: 1988

The changing meaning of ‘democracy’ and the contexts it appears in

Phase 1: 1963

Table 1.1

walk the path of democracy practise, implement, strengthen, stabilise and consolidate democracy accumulate experience

† institutions, system, procedure † changes, reforms

†

† †

† democratic reforms in exile and Tibet † democracy movement in China † elections † the Dalai Lama’s semi-retirement

Phase 3: 1998

Tibetan democracy: † is the people’s responsibility † is related to ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ † is the rule by equal people † is related to freedom † should have high quality † has essential characteristics † is good † †

† † †

† † is the people’s responsibility incorporates ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ is in accordance with Buddhism is liberal and related to freedom has various forms and consists of essentials is good will be complete and authentic in future Tibet † †

† † †

† † is the people’s responsibility is liberal and related to freedom, peace and human rights consists of essentials is good will be complete and authentic in future Tibet has three pillars must be stable in exile

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implementing policies, as well as heading the Councils of Religious Affairs, Home, Foreign Relations and Education. Additionally, there were four offices: that of Information, Security, Civil Services, and Finance.10 The ministers were not responsible to the Tibetans’ representatives in the parliament who had been elected and had taken their oath on 2 September 1960.11 The parliament consisted of three representatives from each of the three provinces in Tibet and one from each of the four major Buddhist sects in Tibet. The seat reserved for a representative of the Bon religion was established in 1977.12 The Dalai Lama furthermore established international relations offices in New York (est. 1960), Geneva (1960), Delhi (1964) and Kathmandu (1964). Nonetheless, the CTA was not recognised as a legal, political authority by any other government but rather as a liaison between Tibetan exiles and the international community. Tibetans received neither substantial political support from other governments, nor were their appeals to the United Nations fruitful. The UN General Assembly’s resolutions concerning Tibet were noncommittal regarding the question of whether Tibet was an independent nation occupied by a foreign power. The resolutions of 1959, 1961 and 1965 expressed concern over violations of fundamental freedoms and rights, but did not address the question of independence.13 However, it was the violations of human rights in Tibet that were put on the international agenda. In his English-language statements, the Dalai Lama also talked about human rights violations, and his critique of Chinese policies in Tibet was harsh. Moreover, he pursued the issues of independence and the return to Tibet. The constitution of Tibet A constitution for Tibet was drafted with advisory help from Ernest Gross who was the deputy US representative in the United Nations.14 In 1961, Gross explained how the Tibetan guerrilla had already ‘lived by a simple code of elementary democracy’ and how this was a useful preparation for planning and setting up an allTibetan government.15 Gross recognised that Tibetans were in a situation where they had to prove their democratic values and ability to govern themselves:

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Tibetans must learn and be ready to practise techniques of selfgovernment. They must convince the rest of the world that they were an independent people, capable of self-government, who had done their share in vindicating the principle of selfdetermination and hence were ready for, and worthy of, the support of those who valued that great principle. These were tasks confronting the Dalai Lama and the Tibetans in the first summer of their exile in 1959. Although they did not know their Locke, Mill and Jefferson, and had traditionally accepted an autocratic form of government, Tibetans by nature are a democratic people. Mountain, space and a feeling of closeness to God produce an instinctive sense of equality and regard for human dignity.16 The constitution draft was completed in July 1961, and to this Gross commented that John Stuart Mill would have approved the Dalai Lama’s reforms as a ‘Himalayan modification of his ideals of a democratically based political economy’.17 In 1963, on the commemoration of the 10 March uprisings in Tibet, the Dalai Lama presented the Constitution of Tibet (Bod kyi rtsa khrims).18 Its historical context was that the exiles expected to return to Tibet any day to establish their government. With this document, the Dalai Lama proved his own and the CTA’s commitment to democracy and human rights, their seriousness as a contender for state power in Tibet, and that they were prepared to return to Tibet. The constitution established a government in future Tibet built upon the principles of institutionalised separation and balance of powers. A national assembly was to be initiated which would consist of representatives mainly elected by the constituencies, but also by religious institutions, regional governments and finally five per cent of which were to be directly appointed by the Dalai Lama (article 39). The position of the Dalai Lama within this future government was that of ultimate authority. For example, article 29 stated that the Dalai Lama held executive power; article 30 that he appointed the ministers and that they were answerable to him; article 32, 38 and 60 that legislation required his assent; article 34 that he may dissolve the

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parliament; and article 60 that he could promulgate decrees. According to the Dalai Lama, this supreme authority was contrary to his personal wishes. For instance, he had imagined a provision in the constitution that he could be removed from office by parliament.19 Since this provision was not included due to opposition from the Tibetan people, the Dalai Lama concluded: ‘I felt that this constitution fell short of my aim for a genuine democracy.’20 Other commentators have drawn the same conclusion, having analysed the constitution as a formal document defining the core elements of classical democracy and its ‘unique features of Tibetan political tradition’.21 Frechette, for instance, glossed traditional Tibetan polity as ‘enlightened government’ and highlighted some articles (articles 29, 32, 35, 36, 37, 39) as examples of how the constitution was a balancing act between American ideals representing modern democracy and Tibetan ideals representing traditional enlightened government.22 Frechette saw Tibetan democratisation as a struggle ‘to forge a logical balance between the competing ideals’ and believed that Tibetans might better understand and accept democracy because the constitution provided democracy with a Tibetan ancestry.23 The Dalai Lama, however, had not envisioned any ‘enlightened government’ in a future free and democratic Tibet, but rather a government produced from popular elections. This does not mean that there were no references to the enlightened teachings of the Buddha, as was obvious, for instance, in article 2 which defined the Tibetan polity as democratic and in accordance with Buddhism: ‘Tibet shall be a unitary democratic state founded upon the principles of the noble chos taught by the Buddha.’24 The promulgation of the constitution launched a wave of public speeches in which the Dalai Lama talked about democracy in the context of future Tibet. He introduced the constitution as a ‘democratic constitution’ (dmangs gtso’i rtsa khrims) on 10 March 1963, whereupon his statements concerning democracy were characteristic in several ways, discussed below. In none of the speeches that I have had access to, have I come across any instances when the Dalai Lama has said that he was giving Tibetans democracy or that democracy was a gift, which was the dominant discourse promoted by Tibetans in general. Instead, he has said that democracy was a ‘responsibility’

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(’gan or las ’gan). The Dalai Lama spoke of democracy within the context of preparing for a successful homecoming and establishment of a democratic government in Tibet along the lines of the Constitution of Tibet. He discussed democracy either as a ‘system’ or ‘practice’ (lugs srol or lam srol), a ‘procedure’ (’gro stangs) and ‘government’ (gzhung). On rare occasions the Dalai Lama ascribed attributes to democracy, such as aspiring for a democracy that is ‘good’ (yag po or legs po) and of ‘high quality’ (ha cang gi spus dag po). The most common expression used by the Dalai Lama at the time, ‘walking the democratic path’ (dmangs gtso’i lam du ’gro), enhanced the understanding of democracy as something which the exiles were moving towards. Furthermore, democracy was something that was to be ‘implemented’ (lag len bstar or lag len bkal) and ‘made use of’ (bed spyod). It was frequently the institutional and structural aspects of democracy that the Dalai Lama mentioned in his speeches. He also talked about the danger of how democracy could be ‘misinterpreted’ (mang gtsor go ba log sgrub byed), and how it was necessary to ‘understand’ (shes or rtogs) or increase one’s understanding of democracy. Characteristic of these early exile days, the Dalai Lama called upon what he considered to be the duty that Tibetans practised the old traditions, but also that they adjusted to the ‘modern times’ (deng dus or deng rabs). The sense of duty and responsibility that the Dalai Lama tried to instil in Tibetan exiles was evident. An example of this was when he spoke to Tibetan students in Mussoorie in 1960, at which time he insisted: ‘All Tibetans, the individual and the collective, man and woman, old and young, everybody has the Tibetan national duty of the dually merged spiritual law and politics.’25 He repeatedly pointed out that although they had to think anew, the traditional Tibetan state ideology of merging the temporal and the spiritual, chos srid zung ’brel, was as imperative as ever.26 He urged the Tibetans to acquaint themselves with other ways of governing that could be seen throughout the world and combine this with their own governance system that incorporated chos, the teachings of the Buddha. Since past governance in Tibet was flawed, Tibetans had to break with the bad ways of the past and practise the good and new ways of the future.

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Adapt to the future The Dalai Lama frequently asked Tibetans to acknowledge their duty to regain freedom in Tibet and to prepare for a democratic future. Concurrently, he wanted them to maintain their national characteristics which entailed the ancient ways of combining the teachings of the Buddha in temporal matters. Nonetheless, not all elements of the past should be continued in exile. When it came to governance, some ways had to be discarded, others had to be maintained as national and unique characteristics, and yet some other new ways had to be adopted. This stance on governance was the Dalai Lama’s reply to Chinese accusations and Western imaginations of the pre-1951 Tibetan governance which deemed Tibet as backward and theocratic.27 The Dalai Lama had to prove his democratic intent and ensure that the Tibetan freedom struggle was not a struggle for reinstalling the undemocratic government of the past, but a struggle for self-determination and democratic reforms the ‘Tibetan way’. One instance was on 17 January 1964, when the Dalai Lama explained how Tibetans had to break with the past and adapt to the future: The old customs are certainly not the way to proceed in future Tibet. Whatever quality might come to future Tibet depends on today’s Tibetan children. Henceforth, by adding the good qualities of the modern world’s governing to our good and unique qualities, the ability to live up to the level of the world’s democratic nations in Tibet is imperative [. . .] The Tibetan policy must be governed by merged dual orders [chos and srid ]. Additionally, it is necessary to govern having assembled the good aspects of modernity, abandoned the bad practices of the past, and added the good aspects of chos srid. Based on that, it is imperative for Tibetan children to study by bringing together the conditions of the world and the quality conditions enabling us to preserve, protect and promote the uniquely Tibetan chos srid.28 Education was a frequent topic in the Dalai Lama’s addresses at the beginning of exile – also in relation to democracy. For example, in

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order to be able to distinguish between the good and the bad in the former system of governance and in order to exercise democracy, Tibetans needed knowledge – that of the modern world and that of traditional Tibet. Occasionally during this first phase, the Dalai Lama also related democracy to the realm of chos, the teachings of the Buddha, and often spoke about how democracy was in accordance with Buddhism. When the Dalai Lama introduced the constitution in his 10 March statement (gsung ’phrin) in 1963,29 he told the Tibetan public that the constitution neither contradicted ‘the teachings of the Buddha’ (ston pa thugs rje can gyi bka’) nor the ‘Tibetan’s own good habits and customs that have flourished since the early Buddhist kings of Tibet’ (bod rje chos rgyal gong dus nas dar ba’i rang re’i goms srol bzang po). Furthermore, he explained that the constitution upheld a ‘democratic system based on equality’ (’dra mnyam dmangs gtso’i srol) and ensured the development of ‘Tibetan chos srid’ (bod kyi chos srid), ‘economy’ (dpal ‘byor) and ‘culture’ (shes rig). On many occasions, the Dalai Lama explained the benefits of the constitution and clarified that democracy was the only choice for Tibetans. As the Dalai Lama explicitly stated on 28 September 1964, there were no alternatives: Likewise, until now, because there were many mistakes in our government, there is no way but to proceed towards democracy or the system of a secular state. There’s not at all a second road. Actually, the Buddha’s intentions were really democratic, only he did not apply democracy when it came to politics.30 While the Dalai Lama admitted to and created a break with the flaws of past governance, he also affirmed that democracy was in accordance with the Buddha’s teachings and thus not a foreign concept forced upon Tibetans. But what exactly was democracy? Rule by equal people The kind of government that the Dalai Lama imagined for Tibetans was not an undemocratic elite rule by aristocracy and clergy like in

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pre-exile times. Instead, he looked towards the ideal of equality as fundamental for democracy when he explained what kind of government Tibetans had achieved in exile. He related this in his 10 March teaching in 1966: If I clarify a little the essentials of our Tibetan government these days, then this government of ours is a government combining chos and srid, but it is also a people’s democratic government. In other words: this government of ours is not a king’s government, nor is it a government held by aristocratic lineages or even a government held by lama throne holders. It is a liberal democratic people’s government. It is imperative that you people, monk and lay, men and women, all of you, know really well that the essentials of our government are such.31 Even before this speech, in 1963, when the constitution was promulgated, the Dalai Lama defined the Tibetan term for democracy, dmangs gtso, as rule by the lower classes that formed the majority: We have to know the meaning of democracy [dmangs gtso] well for actualising democracy combining spiritual law [chos] with politics [srid ] tomorrow. For example, ‘people’ [dmangs] refers to a majority, not to an elite or a wealthy and powerful minority. Instead it refers to the many, the hardworking lower ranks living at the lowest level [of society]. ‘Rule’ [gtso] refers to this majority seizing the lead or becoming the masters of the land. So democracy [dmangs gtso] refers to them seizing the lead and becoming the masters of the country. Moreover, having become the masters of the country and studied well the responsibilities to be taken on, it is indispensable and extremely important to increase one’s understanding and the scope of one’s individual capacity. Otherwise, if one is attached to the mere word ‘democracy’ [dmangs gtso] but does all kinds of things without knowing anything, then nothing but difficulties and mishaps will result.32

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In his speech, the Dalai Lama’s translation of ‘democracy’ (dmangs gtso) was ambiguous, as will be elaborated upon in a later section. He defined democracy as people’s rule (dmangs gtso) in the sense of the lower ranks, but it was also majority rule (mang gtso) since these low classes made up the main body of the population. He also emphasised in this and in other speeches that the people had to educate themselves in order to gain proper qualifications for democracy. He promulgated the idea that democracy only worked properly with an educated people, and therefore, education of the masses – regardless of status and wealth – was crucial since democracy, i.e. majority rule, meant that people themselves ruled proficiently. This democracy, within the few times that he qualified it in this first phase of its conceptual development, was therefore a ‘liberal democracy’ (rang dbang ldan pa’i dmangs gtso or rang dbang dmangs gtso). Sometimes he mentioned democracy together with ‘freedom’ (rang dbang) in his speeches, as in ‘freedom and democracy’ (rang dbang dang dmangs gtso), which highlights another characteristic feature of the Dalai Lama’s dissemination of democracy: that freedom and democracy were in tandem because, in his view, freedom provided opportunities for democratic practices. The Dalai Lama wanted Tibetans to value both. He repeatedly stated that it was imperative for the democratisation process to create the conditions for freedom, and he made Tibetans look towards the world and explained how other countries had adopted democracy. For instance in 1965, when the Dalai Lama explained to a Dharamsala audience how Germany had split into two, the east adopting communism and the west democracy.33 This look towards other transitions to democracy was more frequent in the next and second phase of democracy’s life story, coinciding with the triumph of democracy in eastern Europe.

Democratic expansion (1988) Since the democratic reforms that followed the proclamation of the constitution in 1963 had not met the wishes and standards of the Dalai Lama, when the tenth parliament-in-exile convened in 1988, a new phase of democratisation commenced. In this second phase in the life

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story of democracy, there were several radical developments both in the Dalai Lama’s discourse and in the institutional infrastructure. In looking back, the turn of the decade is commonly viewed as a time when ‘real’ democratic reforms made their impact, and the history of the CTA is commonly perceived as a history of going from less to more democracy, with 1991 as the turning point. There are two main reasons for this: The first reason is the 1991 promulgation of the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile; and the second is that the Tibetan parliament-in-exile assumed more responsibility. In fact, parliament has been accused of playing a subservient role to the cabinet. Several of my informants claimed that the parliament had no real power at that time because it was not capable of setting the political agenda or launching any reforms. In reality, they said, it was the cabinet together with the Dalai Lama that decided and executed policies. In 1988, a clear rupture in the Dalai Lama’s democracy discourse occurred coinciding with what Huntington has termed as the third wave of democracy surging over eastern Europe.34 It must have seemed opportune that communism was disintegrating and democracy was gaining terrain on the world map in the watershed year of 1989. The Dalai Lama referred to these developments in his speeches, and these references often served as the context for talking about democracy in exile and in free Tibet in the future. Occasionally, he optimistically referred to the ‘democracy movement’ (mang gtso’i las ‘gul) in China and to Mao Zedong’s concept of ‘democratic centralism’ (mang gtso gcig sdud) that had been promoted in China in the 1940s. This was far from what the Dalai Lama envisioned for Tibetans, since, in reality, Mao’s version of democracy meant that all power belonged to the people, but the people were represented by the Communist Party. Democratic centralism was, as the Dalai Lama formulated in one speech in 1992, ‘extremely bad’ (ha cang sdug chags).35 In the mid- and late 1980s, the Dalai Lama altered the focus in his English statements to address issues such as human rights, environmental awareness, pacifism and preservation of culture, which were highly professed international values at the time.36 This global turn can, in an instrumental perspective, be interpreted as the Dalai Lama’s strategy to mobilise sympathy and international

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support, a result being the numerous resolutions concerning Tibet from this period. For instance, the CTA’s publication International Resolutions and Recognitions on Tibet is a compilation of 60 resolutions, passed by institutions like the European Parliament, the United Nations General Assembly and the United States Congress. Five resolutions emerged in 1959– 65, and the remaining 55 in the period 1987– 97.37 The increased international focus was obviously due to the Dalai Lama’s extensive world tours, and it was facilitated by the exile-Tibetan foreign missions that were the exile community’s direct access to the international community. Exile-Tibetan diplomacy agencies which connected the CTA to the outside world were based in New York (est. 1960), Geneva (1960), New Delhi (1964) Kathmandu (1964), Tokyo (1975), London (1983), Canberra (1992), Moscow (1993), Pretoria (1997), Taipei (1997), Brussels (2001), along with offices in Paris (1992) and Budapest (1993), which closed later.38 Public relations were in many ways the only resource that the CTA possessed, and the Dalai Lama, from whom these offices had taken their name, sealed their legitimacy with his authority. At the US Congressional Human Rights Caucus in September 1987, the Dalai Lama presented his Five Point Peace Plan for transforming Tibet into a zone of peace, and he elaborated upon these points in the so-called Strasbourg Proposal which was addressed to the European Parliament a year later. At this occasion, the Dalai Lama sought an accommodation with the Chinese government through what he presented as the ‘Middle-Way approach’. With this policy, the Dalai Lama called for negotiation and cooperation between the Tibetans and the Chinese to find a compromise, or what he calls ‘genuine autonomy’ in Tibet – not independence.39 Though the Dalai Lama had been moving towards this new stance for some time, 1988 was the year when he publicly announced it, and from then on repeatedly reconfirmed his commitment to autonomy. The following year, on 10 December 1989, the Dalai Lama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. This proved that he successfully spoke a language that the world appreciated, and in his acceptance speech, the Dalai Lama highlighted the exiles’ efforts in building schools, monasteries and

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democratic institutions, which he equated with modern developments that included the preservation of culture.40 The Dalai Lama, moreover, had also proved his commitment to democracy by downplaying his political role and expressing his wish to reduce his political power. He wanted to replace his political influence with what he considered to be real people’s power. From 1988 when the tenth parliament-in-exile was formed, the Dalai Lama pushed the issue of democratic reforms. At the first audience that the parliament had with the Dalai Lama, he gave an important speech that moved democracy-building further.41 He told the parliament that not only should he not have government responsibilities, but that the people should be taught to make educated decisions knowing the ways of democracy and they should be the ones who democratically elected their representatives. On 6 May 1989, the Dalai Lama instructed the parliament that he wanted a committee to study their 30 years’ experience of democratisation in order to identify the shortcomings and the qualities of exile-Tibetan governance, but also to look at governance in India and abroad, as well as consult political and legal experts.42 The committee, comprised of Juchen Thubten, Samdhong Rinpoche, Wangdu Dorje, Kirti Tulku and Rikha Lobsang Tenzin,43 formulated a charter draft that was presented to the eleventh parliament during its first spring session in 1991.44 The Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile The new charter was not passed without discussion. 71-year-old Namgyal Wangdu, who at the time was a newly elected parliament representative of Utsang, remembered during our conversation 15 years later that three issues were especially controversial:45 the issue concerning which role the Dalai Lama should play in the new democratic set-up; the issue of electing local assemblies and administrators; and finally, the issue of whether Tibetan polity should be defined as what was known in English as ‘secular’.46 Tibetans outside of the parliament also debated these issues, and in some circles debates problematised the very core of democracy. There was even a debate on the spelling, and thus the meaning, of

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democracy in the magazine Ljang gzhon (Young Shoots) volumes 2 and 3 by Tibetan intellectuals Pema Bhum, Ragra Trethong and Samdhong Rinpoche. The first syllable dmangs, in the Tibetan concept dmangs gtso, has predominantly occurred in the term dmangs rigs meaning ‘lower classes’ or ‘low caste’ (Skt s´u¯dra). Translating democracy dmangs gtso (gtso referring to ‘rule’) can thus be understood as putting the lower classes first and letting the masses rule. On the other hand, the first syllable mang, in the second translation of democracy mang gtso, does not point to any class distinction, but to quantity, namely the ‘many’ (mang po) or the ‘majority’ (mang phyogs). The CTA standardised the translation of democracy as mang gtso (‘majority rule’) after 1991, indicating a reinterpretation of democracy away from ‘low’ towards ‘majority’. There are good reasons to believe that this shift to mang gtso has also become a way to distinguish Tibetan democracy from the Chinese impostor: dmangs gtso was the term employed by the communist Chinese to translate their version of democracy into Tibetan language, relating dmangs gtso to reforms, such as distributing the land and riches of the Tibetan clergy and aristocracy. If we take this into account, the shift from dmangs gtso to mang gtso suggests a measure to distinguish between ‘democracy the Chinese way’ (dmangs gtso) and ‘democracy the Tibetan way’ (mang gtso), similar to the distinction that exile-Tibetan officials made between ‘culture’ as applied in Chinese writing (Tib. rig gnas, Chi. we´nhua`) and Tibetan ‘culture’ (rig gzhung).47 There are later evidences of this distinction, for instance in the Dalai Lama’s 10 March statement in 2009 he talked about how the Tibetans upon arrival in exile immediately set out on the ‘path of democracy’ (mang gtso’i lam). At this point, the democracy of the Tibetans was mang gtso, but when he later in the same speech talked about ‘democratic reforms’ in China, he translated democracy as dmangs gtso, for instance when he referred to ‘the so-called “Democratic reform” (dmangs gtso’i bcos bsgyur) enforced in Kham and Amdo, which was out of tune with the actual situation, incited severe turmoil and destruction in effect’.48 In the 1963 constitution, democracy had been translated to Tibetan as dmangs gtso, but in the 1991 charter the translation of democracy became mang gtso. Regardless of whether demos is

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translated into dmangs or mang, the Dalai Lama stressed the equality of people in his speeches, and in its institutionalised form, the CTA had abandoned elite rule. The eleventh parliament-in-exile passed the Charter of the Tibetansin-Exile (Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims) in June 1991.49 The charter did not replace the 1963 constitution since the constitution expressed ideas on how to govern a free Tibet in the future, but the charter regulated the exile polity. It contained the fundamental principles of governance (chapter 1), rights and duties (chapter 2), principles (chapter 3), as well as distinguished between the legislative, executive and judiciary bodies (chapters 4 –6), and described provisions for administering settlements (chapter 7) and the three Commissions for Election (chapter 8), Public Service (chapter 9), and Audit (chapter 10). It is still in effect although the Tibetan parliament-in-exile has made several amendments to it since. The charter defined ‘legislative power’ (khrims bzo’i dbang cha) in chapter 5 held by the ‘Tibetan parliament-in-exile’ (bod mi mang spyi ’thus lhan tshogs) chosen by the people through election. The parliament is supposed to mirror the Tibetan population, but instead of a multi-party system, it adopted a special quota system based on a religion– region template. This template reflected the definition of Tibet and its people by demarcating the territorial boundaries of Tibet and recognising the prominence of religion. It specified that ten seats were reserved for two representatives from each of the five religious traditions recognised as being Tibetan: Bon and the four Buddhist sectarian traditions of Nyingma, Kagyu, Sakya and Gelug. Another 30 seats were reserved for delegates representing the three provinces of geographical Tibet (bod chol kha gsum): Utsang, Kham and Amdo. Only three seats were reserved for exile constituencies: one delegate from North America and two from Europe. Additionally, one to three delegates could be appointed directly by the Dalai Lama.50 The members of parliament chose a ‘speaker’ (tshogs gtso) and a ‘deputy speaker’ (tshogs gtso gzhon pa) and called for meetings bi-annually. If we return to the parliament set-up in 1991, the 46 parliamentarians elected a cabinet (bka’ bshag) consisting of up to seven ‘ministers’ (bka’ blon) and the ‘head of

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government’ (bka’ blon sku bgres). The cabinet held ‘executive power’ (’gan ’dzin dbang cha) as described in chapter 4 of the charter and headed the seven departments for religion and culture (chos rig las khungs), home (nang srid las khungs), education (shes rig las khungs), finance (dpal ‘byor las khungs), security (bde srung las khungs), information and international relations ( phyi dril las khungs) and health (’phrod bsten las khungs).51 ‘Judicial power’ (khrims lugs dbang ‘dzin), described in chapter 6,52 rested with the ‘Supreme Justice Commission’ (ches mtho’i khrims zhib khang) established in 1992. This Dharamsala court could not deal with criminal cases nor punish the locals, but dealt with cases that the government of India did not object to, such as disputes among the settlers. Since Tibetans overall were reluctant to gain political influence at the expense of the Dalai Lama’s power, the eleventh parliament decided that the Dalai Lama should hold a prominent position within exile-Tibetan governance, as established in this first exile charter in 1991. He was the head of the state of Tibet occupied by the PRC and the head of a government-in-exile in accordance with the executive powers ascribed to him in several articles of the charter, for instance article 19. He could approve bills passed by the parliament, promulgate acts that have the force of law and dissolve parliament. Although the Dalai Lama had wanted to abolish his traditional final say in all political matters, Tibetans resisted this, also at the time when the charter was instituted. However, a year later, the Dalai Lama promised that he would not hold political office in free Tibet in the future. Visions for a free and democratic Tibet in the future The charter was followed with a statement by the Dalai Lama entitled Guidelines for Future Tibet’s Polity and the Basic Features of its Constitution, where he presented his updated plan for democratic governance in future Tibet.53 At this time, he wrote with 30 years of experience from exile and commented upon the shortcomings of the 1963 constitution. For the Dalai Lama, the polity in occupied Tibet in 1992 was a ‘totalitarian system, dubbed democracy’ in contrast to the kind of

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democracy that he envisioned for free Tibet in the future that would be a ‘true democracy’.54 Democracy the ‘Tibetan way’, as he imagined for Tibet in the future, should cover ethnographic Tibet, i.e. not only the official Chinese-defined Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), but also the eastern territories of Kham and Amdo. The Dalai Lama envisioned a parliamentary system with seats based on a multi-party system.55 Legislative power would have two chambers: the House of Regions and the House of People. The latter would be the highest law-making body consisting of representatives based on a constituency which is demarcated in accordance with population distribution. The House of Regions was to consist of members elected by regional assemblies. A president and a vice president were to be elected by the members of the two houses, and executive powers were to be vested in a prime minister emerging from the majorityholding groups and the council of ministers which the prime minister was to form. The Dalai Lama was not to hold any ‘traditional political position in the government’ in future Tibet.56 Instead, he imagined remaining a public figure who could offer advice in cases when the ‘political mechanisms’ were unable to solve ‘particularly significant and difficult problems’, but he did not wish any official position. Nonetheless, although it did not refer to his own position, spirituality was not to be absent in the future constitution of Tibet since the Tibetan polity would be founded on what he called ‘spiritual values’. Furthermore, the fundamental principle of the future government referred to the Human Rights Declaration, ensuring the fundamental rights and duties of citizens and referred to Tibet as a zone of peace,57 similar to the charter’s article 3 on the ‘nature of polity’. What was particularly different from the 1963 constitution and the 1991 charter was the Dalai Lama’s vision of two houses, his own complete withdrawal from politics and his instructions on the interim government, i.e. the transitional government in Tibet in the future.58 Apart from that, the document assured the Tibetans, the Chinese and the international community that, although the CTA now had instituted a charter regulating governance-in-exile, it was still committed to the struggle for a successful homecoming to

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establish a democratic government in Tibet. This commitment was also evident in the Dalai Lama’s Tibetan-language speeches at the time. Similar to speeches delivered during the first phase, the Dalai Lama often pointed towards the ‘democratic constitution’ (mang gtso’i rtsa khrims) as a reference to the inception of democracy among Tibetan exiles. He also referred to the first time democracy emerged on 2 September 1960, relating to this incident as the historic ‘democracy day’ (mang gtso’i dus chen) that had been celebrated since 1985, as well as frequently referring to democracy’s new building block: the charter. Henceforth, he also spoke at length about ‘democratic elections’ (mang gtso’i ’os bsdu) and, in particular, elections of members of parliament. As in the first phase, he spoke about the ‘democratic system’ (mang gtso’i lam lugs), ‘democratic procedures’ (mang gtso’i ‘gro stangs), and ‘democratic practices’ (mang gtso’i lag len). He moreover explained the various features of the ‘democratic government’ (mang gtso’i gzhung) or ‘government that has a democratic nature’ (mang gtso’i rang bzhin ldan pa’i gzhung). Furthermore, in this second phase, the Dalai Lama spoke about democracy in a manner that was more nuanced and complex than during previous speeches. He defined democracy as ‘liberal’ (rang dbang), but also as encompassing chos srid zung ‘brel (merged spiritual law and politics). Liberal democracy with merged spiritual law and politics Similar to the first phase, the Dalai Lama mentioned freedom and democracy in the same breath. It is striking that, apart from being mentioned as separate entities (‘freedom and democracy’ (rang dbang dang mang gtso)), they were increasingly referred to as one entity (rang dbang mang gtso or rang dbang ldan pa’i mang gtso) that translates well into ‘liberal democracy.’ However, when the Dalai Lama qualified ‘liberal democracy’, he occasionally defined it as something that could be improved and strived towards: ‘a pure, modern liberal democracy’ (deng dus dang mthun pa’i rang dbang mang gtso gtsang ma zhig), ‘a perfect liberal democracy’ (mang gtso rang dbang yang dag pa zhig), ‘a liberal democracy complete with all elements’ (rang dbang mang gtso mtshan nyid tshang ba zhig) or ‘an authentic liberal democracy’ (dngos

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gnas rang dbang mang gtso tshad mthun zhig). Furthermore, democracy was now mentioned together with values like ‘human rights’ (’gro ba mi’i thob thang) and ‘peace’ (zhi bde), which were important topics in his English-language speeches as well. He also often mentioned ‘democratic rights’ (mang gtso’i thob thang) and ‘liberal democratic rights’ (rang dbang mang gtso’i thob thang). The Dalai Lama pointed out that the democratic system of the Tibetan exiles was a special form of liberal democracy since it maintained ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ’brel), was ‘in accordance with Buddhism’ (nang pa sangs rgyas pa’i chos dang mthun pa) or was a ‘liberal democracy combining spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid gnyis ldan gyi rang dbang mang gtso). A stable feature of his discourse on democracy since 1963 was that he frequently stressed that although democracy characterised modernity, Tibetans nevertheless had natural propensities towards democracy because the Buddha and his teachings were essentially in accordance with democracy. Therefore, the Dalai Lama asserted it was incorrect when the Chinese claimed Tibet was backward. By such statements, the Dalai Lama made modernity and democracy into something already Tibetan, while at the same time he challenged Chinese allegations. In a speech on 6 May 1989, the Dalai Lama let the audience of Tibetan people’s representatives understand that they were already familiar with democracy: Even though the application [of democracy] as a political system is a recent issue of this time, it [represents] a basic attitude where priority must be given to the welfare of the public. This way of thinking is clearly represented in the teachings of the Buddha in general and the Mahayana in particular. Therefore, a person who has comprehended the teachings of the Buddha has a way of thinking that relates to societal development. Such a person will be very pleased to hear or think of democracy and it will naturally make that person happy. [. . .] If we take the Tibetan situation as an example, when we discuss the reality of the Tibetan issue with the Chinese, they

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are unable to respond directly to the truth of this point. Instead, they resort to the excuse that the old Tibetan society was very backward and savage. From such [a] viewpoint, it is a crucial issue for us to actualise democracy.59 At the beginning of exile, the Dalai Lama had informed Tibetans that it was necessary to discard the bad old ways, preserve the good old ways and adopt the new. During the second phase beginning in 1988, he talked about the Ganden Phodrang’s democratic transformation in the same vein. Thus, he upheld the authority of the traditional government and confirmed the present CTA’s link to independent Tibet in the past. An example of this dynamic appears in the Dalai Lama’s teaching in Varanasi on 29 January 1988: Then, after arriving in India, I said that we must walk the path of democracy. While I basically do the work of maintaining the Ganden Phodrang established by the Fifth Dalai Lama, it is necessary to walk the path of democracy and transform the form of the Ganden Phodrang. Democracy is not only in agreement with the chos taught by the Buddha, but it is in principle not incompatible with chos. Likewise, being a way of thinking that is on the increase in today’s world, we have effectuated several tasks manifesting the forms of democratic rule and electing representatives.60 Not only did the Dalai Lama highlight the CTA’s link to the past and the need to democratise, he also linked his own democratic aspiration to pre-communist Tibet. In fact, the Dalai Lama claimed that he had wanted reforms along similar lines even before he left Tibet.61 Through these assertions, he strengthened the link between the Tibetan past and the exile present. He created a sense of democracy as something that would also have been implemented according to his wishes if he had remained in Tibet. There were frequent references to past governance and the Buddha’s teachings made by the Dalai Lama when he spoke about democracy in the second phase. Apparently, the Dalai Lama wanted to instil in

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Tibetans a sense that democracy is not an unfamiliar or foreign concept, but an aspect of Tibetan history. Completion of genuine democracy: relieving the Dalai Lama At this time, the Dalai Lama increasingly qualified democracy, not only in simple terms as ‘good’ (yag po or legs po) or ‘high quality’ (spus dag po) as he did in the 1960s. He frequently turned to qualities that referred to the completion of the democratisation process by attaching to democracy attributes describing its completion (mtshan nyid tshang ba, mtshan nyid yongs su tshang ba, yongs su rdzogs pa or yongs su tshang ba) and authenticity (ming don mtshungs pa, drang bden, dngos ‘brel, dngos gnas, dngos gnas drang gnas or yang dag pa). A frequent issue regarding which reforms were needed in order to reach a complete and authentic democracy was his own political position. On several occasions he clarified that in future Tibet he would not act as ‘the head of the Tibetan government’ (bod gzhung gi ’go khrid). He connected this to ‘responsibilities’ (‘gan or las ‘gan) – those of the Dalai Lama and those of the people – and explained how the emergence of a ‘truly genuine democracy’ (dngos gnas drang gnas kyi don dam pa’i mang gtso) required that he did not hold any government responsibility. He believed that democracy would be crippled if he continued his position as a political leader. In a speech delivered on 6 May 1989, he made a parallel between implementing democracy with the Dalai Lama as its leader with simply putting a new patch on an old tree: If that which has been called the Dalai Lama leadership is not reformed in view of procedures and structure, then whatever we do to make democracy emerge separately is similar to patching up an old tree trunk. So, it is not necessary that the Dalai Lama acts as a leader, but it is necessary, however, to create a chief leader who has emerged from completely democratic elections. For example, America has a system of electing a president. Furthermore, the procedure of India and Great Britain is that the elected political party appoints the prime minister from among the party.62

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In other speeches, the Dalai Lama stated that he did not want Tibetans to depend on him to make decisions; instead, it was time that they took responsibility. Though this message was made repeatedly, he nonetheless realised that Tibetans would find it difficult to assume the responsibility of democracy. In one speech from 1988, the Dalai Lama believed that it was the unquestioning faith that Tibetans had in him that obstructed the maturation of their individual responsibility.63 He warned Tibetans about their overdependence on him and cautioned that ‘having immense dependence on one person is extremely dangerous’ (mi gcig la shin tu ltos tshabs chen po yod pa ’di ha cang nyen kha chen po red). He later specified in a speech he gave in 1991 that it would not be according to democracy if ‘ultimate authority is handled by one person’ (mi gcig gis mthar thug gi dbang cha yongs rdzogs ’dzin pa).64 Thus, it was clear that the Dalai Lama recognised that there was scope for further democratic reforms. He pointed out in several of his speeches that there was a fuller form of democracy that could be achieved. There were democratic ‘forms’ (mang gtso’i rnam pa) and ‘essentials’ (mang gtso’i ngo bo), some of which the Tibetan exiles adopted in 1963, others which they did not have as of yet. To meet these insufficiencies, the Dalai Lama spoke about ‘actualising democracy’ (mang gtso byed pa) and the need for ‘democratic reforms’ (mang gtso’i bsgyur bcos), ‘democratic changes’ (mang gtso’i ’gyur ba) and ‘democratisation’ (mang gtso’i thog ’gro or mang gtso je cher gtong). With the reforms introduced in the charter, he wanted to mend these flaws of democracy in the Tibetan exile community. Not talk only, but actual acts The Dalai Lama continually stressed that democracy was not built from talk only, but was something one ‘actualises’ (byed). It was essential to ‘implement’ (lag len bkal), ‘augment’ (shugs che ru ’gro) and ‘consolidate’ (sra brtan) ‘democracy’ (mang gtso) or the ‘democratic nature’ (mang gtso’i rang bzhin). His processual understanding of democracy was obvious in this second phase since he spoke about a democracy model that was already in progress. This is one explanation of why the Dalai Lama talked more about democratisation than

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democracy as such. This processual understanding of democracy is also indicated by frequently used expressions such as ‘walk the democratic path’ (mang gtso’i lam la ’gro), ‘walk the road of immaculate democracy’ (mang gtso gtsang ma zhig gi lam la ’gro), ‘be bound for democracy’ (mang gtso’i thog skyod or mang gtso’i thog ’gro) or ‘proceed on the democratic path’ (mang gtso’i lam du bskyod). He used these expressions even more frequently in the second phase than in the first. It is important to note here that the path that the exiles were walking was to be a path leading to complete and genuine democracy in a free Tibet in the future. Furthermore, the Dalai Lama commonly talked about democracy as ‘important’ (gal chen po), as ‘needed’ or ‘necessary’ (dgos), and as something Tibetans had to ‘strive’ (’bad brtson) for. This involved the need to ‘accumulate experience of democracy’ (mang gtso’i nyams myong bsags or nyam myong rim gsog), as well as inner development, because ‘democracy is a way of thinking’ (bsam blo’i ’khyer so mang gtso yin pa). Therefore, Tibetans must ‘strengthen the understanding of democracy’ (mang gtso’i go rtogs shugs che ru ’gro), ‘strengthen the comprehension of the meaning of democracy’ (mang gtso’i go don shes rtogs shugs che byung), develop ‘democratic feelings’ (mang gtso’i tshor ba) and ‘reflect’ (bsam blo gtong). In the first phase, the Dalai Lama never mentioned democracy as a gift, but in the second period, he occasionally referred to democracy as something Tibetans regarded as a gift. It is interesting to note that he never declared democracy to be a gift from himself, but it was commonly referred to as a gift, for instance when Tibetans mentioned: ‘we got the gift of democracy’ (nga tshor mang gtso gsol ras gnang byung zhes) as the Dalai Lama also referred to in a speech in 1992.65 Tibetans used such expressions in their own discourse, but the Dalai Lama pointed out that merely talking about it like that was not valid. They had to enact democracy. In the Dalai Lama’s speech on 3 September 1988, the Dalai Lama challenged his audience’s own discourse of democracy as a gift and warned them that mere talk was not sufficient. Democracy demanded practice in real terms, he said, and stressed the importance of the completion and authenticity of democracy. This also demanded that he withdrew from politics, and he asked:

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What needs to be done now? It is not to think and be like in the past, just trotting on saying ‘We are democratic. We have been given democracy’. I thought, however, would it not be a good thing to reflect a little on how to carefully explain and heighten public awareness of this matter?66 The Dalai Lama was confident that real democratising efforts in exile would enable Tibetans to implement democracy in future Tibet. The future depended on actual practice in the present. In this way, he encouraged Tibetan exiles to work continuously towards accumulating experiences of democracy while in exile. Thus, he not only strengthened the link between democracy and the Tibetan past in his speeches, but he also ascertained that Tibetans understood democracy’s relation to a future free Tibet. In his 10 March statement in 1990, he interlinked democracy and the struggle for future Tibet: Because this freedom struggle of ours is for the rights, freedom and the future happiness of six million Tibetans, we certainly must consolidate the democratic institutions and democratic system. As I have said many times, for the creation of modern Tibet and the development of the people, it is crucial to value freedom and democracy.67 It was necessary, therefore, that Tibetans exercise democracy in the present in order to be able to implement democracy in free Tibet in the future. The democracy project was thus part of their struggle and preparation for the future, and this responsibility lay upon the exiles who now lived in freedom. In the third and last phase in democracy’s life story told here, the people’s responsibility and ownership of democracy becomes more pronounced and is finally put to a test.

Semi-retirement (1998) The Dalai Lama had toned down his criticism of China after he introduced his Middle-Way approach. He sent delegates to Beijing for talks in September 2002, but nine rounds of talks between his

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envoys and representatives from the United Front Work Department, the Beijing office that handles the Tibet issue, did not lead to any solution and the talks ended in 2010. In fact, Beijing repeatedly put forward allegations that the ‘Dalai clique’ was ‘splittist’.68 What were seen by the Dalai Lama as reconciliation gestures were perceived by the Chinese government as dangerous rhetoric. This Chinese discourse stood in sharp contrast to the welcome that the Dalai Lama received elsewhere. Not only did he travel the world to lecture, he also accepted several prizes, honorary titles and medals around the world. Though such diplomatic gestures by international agents might have had a good psychological effect on Tibetans in believing that these gestures would convert into political acts that had real impact for the Tibetan cause, Tibetans were repeatedly let down by the international community. Nevertheless, pro-Tibet statements issued by international leaders, resolutions from foreign governments and transnational organisations, as well as the Dalai Lama’s handshakes with leaders and celebrities were all documented by Tibetan exiles. They were displayed in their periodicals as evidence of recognition and support of the Tibetan cause and were sources for reinvigorating the Tibetan freedom struggle. The launching of the third wave of democratisation efforts and the third phase of the life story of the democracy concept promoted by the Dalai Lama started in 1998 when the Dalai Lama urged the twelfth parliament-in-exile to accept further democratic reforms, which included a relinquishment of his own political power and responsibility. Reforms in the election procedures of cabinet ministers and the prime minister meant that the Dalai Lama was released from some of his burdens in this phase. The Dalai Lama stressed the importance of ‘democratisation’ (mang gtso’i ngo bor bsgyur bcos gtong), to ‘democratise’ (mang gtso’i thog ’gro or mang gtso bor gyur pa) and the need for democratic ‘changes’ (bsgyur or ’gyur ba). As earlier, he talked about walking the democratic path and about the responsibilities that rested with the people. It is noteworthy that the Dalai Lama did not, to the same extent as before, refer to the constitution or the charter. Never did he refer to the gift of democracy. Furthermore, he seldom related democracy to Buddha,

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chos, or ‘merged spiritual law and politics’. When he spoke about democracy, it was with reference to democracy in both Tibet and exile. Occasionally, he spoke of India as an example of a democratic nation, and he evaluated China’s state of ‘democracy, freedom and human rights’ (mang gtso dang/ rang dbang/ ’gro ba mi’i thob thang). Apart from listing democracy together with ‘human rights’ (gro ba mi’i thob thang), the Dalai Lama would often place democracy in line with ‘freedom’ (rang dbang), ‘peace’ (zhi bde) and ‘autonomy’ (rang skyong). Furthermore, he referred optimistically to Chinese ‘political movements’ (chab srid las ’gul) fighting for these values. His frequent references to China are exemplified in his opening address to the thirteenth parliament in 2001. He spoke about ‘genuine liberal democracy’ (don dam pa’i mang gtso rang dbang) and compared Chinese and Tibetan abilities: From the perspective of the degree of power, compared to China, we have none at all. Nevertheless, from the perspective of walking the path of true democracy, compared to China, we will be the able ones.69 Popularly elected leaders Leadership and elections were important topics in this third phase, and in particular the issues of the election of prime minister and the semi-retirement of the Dalai Lama were stressed. In his speech on Democracy Day in 2005, he explained how Buddhist scriptures praise the leader who enjoys universal respect in order to explain the importance of popularly elected leaders. This was similar to modern democracy, exactly because of the popular consensus that backed such a leader. Thus, some form of democracy was already part of Tibetan Buddhist culture. Tibet might very well be able to undergo democratic transitions like the Western world had done: From the many experiences amassed, the democratic system develops and matures progressively in the countries of the Western world. In the past history of Tibet, the land of snow, the first leader of the people’s society was termed ‘the king of

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universal respect’ [mang pos bkur ba’i rgyal po]. ‘The king of universal respect’ means that he was approved by the people. We say that the person who has the support of the people acts as the leader. Therefore, the institutional structure in the old days was similar to the basic structure of democracy, though not exactly modern.70 As in the second phase, the Dalai Lama repeatedly told his audience that in future Tibet he would not act as the head of government. Instead, majority votes should determine who was to be leader in a democratic set-up. He frequently conveyed this message to Tibetans, for instance when he spoke to newly arrived Tibetans in India on 25 September 1998: ‘Though it was the Dalai Lama who acted as Tibet’s religious and political leader in the past, the head of the Tibetan government in the future will be popularly elected.’71 Since the beginning of exile, the Dalai Lama had publicly started to distinguish between his religious and political leadership and tried to downplay the political dimension of his authority. In a speech on 16 September 1998, the Dalai Lama informed the parliament that further democratic reforms were needed to relieve the Dalai Lama of some of his political responsibilities.72 Since an amendment in 1993 of article 21 in the charter,73 he had nominated the candidates to the posts as cabinet ministers. He argued that not only was it difficult for him to name suitable candidates, but it was also not in accordance with democratic principles. He wanted a new procedure for the election of ministers. The amendment of article 21 in 2001 gave the provisions for popular elections of the prime minister, who then nominated his ministers who in their turn could be approved or rejected by the parliament.74 Now the Tibetan demos took the responsibility for electing a prime-ministerin-exile, and the prime minister took the responsibility for electing his cabinet. These democratic reforms marked the completion of a democratic mechanism that was eventually to replace the Dalai Lama. The preliminary round for the first election of the prime-minister-inexile was held on 21 May 2001 when Tibetans had to name at least four candidates for the position. According to the election rules,75 the electorate voted from a list of a minimum of two candidates in the

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second round, and the prime minister who emerged with the majority of votes could nominate up to seven ministers to form the cabinet. In the 2001 elections, former speaker Samdhong Rinpoche won 84 per cent of the votes, and was re-elected with an overwhelming majority of 90 per cent of the votes in 2006.76 After the 2001 election of the prime minister, Samdhong Rinpoche, the position that he filled became a frequent reference in the Dalai Lama’s statements to exemplify how democracy had reached a full institutional form in exile. On Democracy Day in 2005, the Dalai Lama spoke of the stages of democratic development in exile, and how ‘direct elections’ (thad kar ’os ’dems) of the prime minister had produced a ‘political leader’ (chab srid ’go khrid) chosen by the people.77 He said that each democratic reform had been crucial and that each ‘democratic stage’ (mang gtso’i ’phel rim) had been successful. Tibetan exiles, he stated, should be proud of their democratisation as this had also gained them the world’s praise. These elections, he insisted, proved the Tibetans’ democratic intent and falsified Chinese claims that the Dalai Lama was set to re-establish outdated theocracy in Tibet: Today’s prime minister was directly elected by the people, so he is the minister who came forth. This, a great victory of each reform and a fine success in each democratic stage, is worthy of our pride. Everyone in the world will praise, but Communist China must remain silent. While the leaders of the Chinese government have frequently said, and continue to say, that we will revive the old society, we on our side have earnestly made great democratic progress. That His Holiness is the religious and political leader guiding the society of the Tibetan people means in reality that he is authorised to make decisions on behalf of many. This we have been able to reform so that the leader carrying complete responsibility has emerged from popular elections in a reasonable and happy manner.78 The latest step that the exiles had taken on the path of democracy, namely directly electing a prime minister, led the Dalai Lama to

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declare that he was ‘semi-retired’ often by using the English word in his Tibetan language speeches, or, as became more frequent later on, by saying in Tibetan: phyed rgan yol. The Dalai Lama, at the 2004 autumn session of the thirteenth parliament, declared: ‘Since selecting a political leader through democratic election, my circumstance is what I in English confidently, loudly and clearly call semi-retirement.’79 The Dalai Lama had successfully pushed democracy further by letting the democratic elections of a political leader ensure that he could diminish his own political leadership and proclaim himself semi-retired. Another reference to this English expression in his Tibetan-language speeches appeared on 23 September 2002. The Dalai Lama told his audience that although he did not believe that the Tibetan freedom struggle would be marginalised by his departure, it would still be vital to have a strong, democratic institutional frame: Regardless of whether the Dalai Lama lives or not, we must struggle for Tibetan freedom. Similarly, Tibetan exiles living in free countries must restore and preserve the distinct chos and culture, and those who fight for our freedom must be able to live high quality lives steadily. Regardless of whether the Dalai Lama has all responsibility or not, the need for making this democratic institutional frame solid is of utmost importance. Occasionally, I jokingly say in English that I am semi-retired. In any case, if we do Tibetan-style counting I am approaching seventy. Our struggle for the Tibetan cause is neither for the sake of the Dalai Lama nor for the sake of the Dalai Lama institution. Likewise, it is also not for us, the exile minority. It is for the sake of six million Tibetans.80 On several occasions, the Dalai Lama had encouraged the Tibetans to contemplate how to organise politically without the Dalai Lama. He explained the move towards creating democratic institutions and mechanisms for decision-making as a method to replace his own political power. The increased responsibility placed on the Tibetan people and their representative body was also a way to prevent the

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Chinese from taking over the institution of legitimate governance of the Tibetan nation by ensuring that succession to legitimate power was realised through democratic elections and not reincarnation. The insight behind this move was that legitimate democratic power had more longevity than the institution of the Dalai Lama. My interviewees fearfully related to a future freedom struggle that was not led by the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama had for a long time repeatedly expressed in public that he wanted Tibetans to democratically elect their political leaders, and this fear amongst Tibetans that the Dalai Lama would leave them became more acute as the phase proceeded – something that I shall return to at the end of this chapter – now that the Dalai Lama’s own democratising efforts had led him into a paradoxical position that he called ‘semiretirement’. Declaring himself as semi-retired allowed him to simultaneously proclaim the exile-Tibetan institutional frame ‘completely democratic’, and this was a frequent topic he addressed when he spoke about democracy. It was ‘the three pillars of democracy’ (mang gtso’i ka ba gsum), the parliament, the council, and the justice commission all intact and functioning in Dharamsala – that testified to this completion. Stabilising the three pillars of democracy The reforms in this third phase introduced ‘the three pillars of democracy’ (mang gtso’i ka ba gsum) as a new feature in the Dalai Lama’s discourse. The Dalai Lama told the thirteenth parliament at their autumn session in 2004 that he was satisfied with the overall institutional framework which was constituted by three pillars, namely ‘the institution of the parliament, the institution of the executive council, and the institution of the Justice Commission’.81 The judiciary pillar received extra attention in his speeches because the local justice commissions in Bylakuppe and Dekyiling were established in 2001. He now recognised the ‘modern democratic system’ (deng dus mang gtso’i ’gro stangs), the ‘democratic institutions’ (mang gtso’i sgrig ’dzugs) and ‘the exile-government institutions’ (btsan byol gzhung gi sgrig ’dzugs) as complete. When the Dalai Lama spoke on 10 March 2001, he acknowledged the great achievements that the

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Tibetan exiles had attained, along with their exclusive position among other exile communities as they had established a full form of democracy: I always believed that the future Tibetan government would become a non-sectarian democratic government. I firmly believe that there is not even a single person among Tibetans in Tibet and in exile who wishes to restore the old Tibetan society. I understood from the very beginning that the social system of Tibet needed to change, and when I lived in Tibet I launched reforms under difficult political circumstances. Since we arrived in exile and until the present, I have kept reminding Tibetan exiles that it was necessary to proceed on the path of democracy. Now, even we Tibetan exiles are one of the few exile societies that have the three pillars of democracy – the legislative, the judiciary, and the executive councils – complete. This year the election procedure of the council’s prime minister has been changed, so the essentials of democracy have been strengthened, and I will transfer the daily responsibility of the exile-Tibetan society to the parliament and the prime minister emerging from elections.82 Though the three pillars had been erected and the institutional framework was in place, democracy was still something they had to ‘actualise’ (byed) and ‘implement’ (lag len bstar or lag len bkal), and the Dalai Lama stressed the importance of accumulating the ‘experience of democracy’ (mang gtso’i nyams myong). Similar to the previous phase, he encouraged his audience to ‘make efforts’ (’bad brtson byed) in order to reach the goal of democratisation that was to make democracy complete and authentic. Furthermore, as in earlier phases, the Dalai Lama spoke about democracy as a process and a path leading to free Tibet. He pointed out that, in exile, the democratisation process had not come to an end, but had given rise to actual democracy. That is to say that the Dalai Lama now not only talked about how important it was to ‘strengthen’ (shugs che ru ’gro) and ‘augment’ (mang gtso shugs cher gtong) democracy, but also about the importance of a ‘stable’ (sra brtan

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or brtan po) democracy in exile. This new feature in the Dalai Lama’s discourse fits well with his frequent appeal to ‘consolidate’ or ‘stabilise’ democracy (sra brtan che ru gtong or sra brtan gong spel). Thus, in the third phase, the Dalai Lama emphasised that stabilising democracy in exile could benefit the prospects of establishing democracy in Tibet, thus interlinking democracy-building and the struggle for freedom. In his address on Democracy Day in 2005, he talked about the ‘democratic progress’ (mang gtso’i mdun bskyod) of exile-Tibetan society. The Dalai Lama confidently believed that Tibetans one day could prove the Chinese wrong and actually be able to govern themselves democratically: This democratic advancement of ours has in all respects become something that has great benefit and prestige. The day will certainly come in the future when Tibetans at home and in exile reunite in Tibet. When such good times come, having accumulated experiences in India, we wish to be able to democratise. If we do not accomplish that, then we have to act like China. We have kept our hopes strong and our methods complete so that we may earnestly proceed towards liberal democracy. We have insisted and proceeded. Our celebration of Democracy Day is significant.83 Though it was time to stabilise democracy in the Tibetan exile, it did not mean that the Dalai Lama now saw exile as a permanent condition. He rather viewed the consolidation of democracy in exile as strengthening the prospects for establishing democracy in Tibet. The Dalai Lama also looked towards the future when he in November 2007 announced that he might call for a referendum to determine whether all future Dalai Lamas should be democratically elected to the function of being a religious authority. Even the very existence of the institution itself could be placed in the hands of the electorate, he suggested.84 He had previously mentioned the possibility of terminating the Dalai Lama institution or democratically electing Dalai Lamas, but now the issue of his reincarnation was acutely topical. In July 2007, the Chinese government announced a measure

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for regulating the discovery and installation of reincarnated lamas, whom it refers to as ‘living buddhas’, in the PRC.85 The State Administration of Religious Affairs passed the ‘State Order No. 5: Management Measures for the Reincarnation of Living Buddhas in Tibetan Buddhism’ regulating the identification, installation, education and practice of religious leaders in Tibet by grooming them into subjects loyal to Beijing and using them for political purposes. State Order No. 5 criminalises lamas who reincarnate in exile by demanding: that those involved in the procedure must be authorised by the state; that the education of living buddhas must be approved by the state; and that the reincarnation of important living buddhas must be approved by the State Council.86 The secular Chinese government had for a long time regulated religion in Tibet, but the new measure affirmed the fear among Tibetan exiles that not only was Tibet secularised by museumifying religion or persecuting religion, but that Beijing also prepared for the demise of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and was ready to take control over the next reincarnation. The Dalai Lama denounced Order No. 5 and also responded to it in a lengthy statement four years later in September 2011, following a meeting in Dharamsala between the leaders of the main schools of Tibetan Buddhism, suggesting that the Dalai Lama sought their consent on matters regulating his successor.87 The document goes into detail on the meaning of reincarnation, its historical origin in Tibet, the Ganden Phodrang institution, how reincarnations are identified, and defines the acceptable methods for selecting the Dalai Lama’s successor.88 Here the Dalai Lama introduces a novel practice for succession that potentially can resolve the interregnum crisis between the Fourteenth and the recognition and enthronement of the Fifteenth Dalai Lama. Instead of finding a ‘reincarnation’ (sprul sku), i.e. a child that must be educated within the tradition before he or she can be enthroned as an adult, they can find an ‘emanation’ (sprul ba) that can be recognised before the Dalai Lama passes away and who can already be an adult educated to take up this responsibility.89 This is possible because, as Barnett has elaborated,90 while the reincarnation takes form as a separate body after the predecessors’ death, the emanation is someone who reflects the Dalai Lama without being the

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same person. The interim period between two Dalai Lamas has historically been politically unstable and dangerous, but suggesting succession through emanation in order to ensure transference of spiritual authority has the potential to solve this problem. The transference of his religious power is an issue of immense importance to the Chinese policy-makers and to the Tibetans inside and outside of Tibet. It is even more important than the transference of the Dalai Lama’s political authority traditionally inherent in the Dalai Lama institution, which he had already dealt with a few months before: by devolving the political powers of the Dalai Lama and every future Dalai Lama to the prime-minister-in-exile and the judiciary.

Devolution of power (2011) In this last phase of the development of democracy in the normative domain, the Dalai Lama’s withdrawal from Tibetan polity in exile was actualised after five decades of democracy-building. In the Dalai Lama’s speech to the nation delivered on 10 March 2011, he announced that he would ask the Tibetan parliament-in-exile to make the necessary amendments to the charter that would allow him to retire from politics.91 Though they had long been warned about this unavoidable development, Tibetans were devastated by his statement. The Dalai Lama received hundreds of protests from Tibetans at home and abroad, urging him to continue his leadership, but the Dalai Lama insisted. In a teaching to a Tibetan audience at his temple on the 19 March 2011, he summed up the Tibetan accomplishments of democratisation in exile as well as related to his audience’s own translation of democracy as a gift. He argued that they had to accept his withdrawal from Tibetan polity: Having arrived in India, we began the democratic movement in 1960. During more than thirty or forty years, we have worked earnestly and established this movement step by step. A saying amongst the entire Tibetan community goes: ‘His Holiness gave the gift of democracy [mang gtso gsol ras gnang ]’ speaking as if there is something solid to be offered. It went like that until

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now [. . .] Actually, from the day of appointing a prime minister through election, all the Dalai Lama’s [spiritual and political] authority of the dual Tibetan system [bod kyi lugs gnyis kyi dbang cha ] held through the Ganden Phodrang institution has ended. Therefore, I say ‘I am semi-retired’ [ phyed rgan yol ]. Ten years have passed since then. So, sooner or later we must actualise a complete and authentic democracy. The rule by kings and great lamas, that was the talk of old times.92 The Dalai Lama wanted the Tibetans to understand that his position was not in accordance with modern democracy, and that the dual position of the Dalai Lama as someone with both political and spiritual influence was undesirable and unwise. In order to make his point, he told them about the failure of the Chinese system to truly meet the needs and wishes of the people. He then turned to his own position and criticised Tibetan democracy, and concluded that ‘similarly, because one-man rule never was any good, in the end, it is basically not good if I wield any power as the Dalai Lama’. He explained the Dalai Lama institution within a historical perspective: Dalai Lama’s leadership of both chos and srid had not begun with the First to the Fourth Dalai Lama. It happened from the time of the Fifth Dalai Lama with the help of the Mongol Gushri Khan and for several reasons, and it has brought about benefits. Now we have reached the twenty-first century. The reformation will bring about changes sooner or later. If change happens under the pressure of another person then I think it will be a disgrace to the former Dalai Lamas. From the time of the Fifth Dalai Lama, Ngawang Lobsang Gyatso, the Dalai Lamas have assumed chos and srid leadership over Tibet. Since I am the fourteenth in line of Dalai Lamas, it is very appropriate if I voluntarily, happily and proudly withdraw the Dalai Lama’s chos srid leadership. No one else can do this.93 In this seminal speech on 19 March 201194 and in an instruction given five days earlier to the parliament,95 the Dalai Lama firmly

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established that this was his final decision and that nothing could change his mind. It is especially interesting in the above excerpt and in the details given later in the speech that he explains that the Dalai Lama institution historically played two different roles. The first four Dalai Lamas did not exert political power, but spiritual authority only. The Fifth Dalai Lama was given the authority to rule Tibet in 1642, and he established the Ganden Phodrang that became the institution in which the Dalai Lama ruled both as a ‘religious head’ (chos phyogs kyi ’go khrid) and as a ‘political authority’ (chab srid kyi ’gan dbang). Thus, the Dalai Lama explains that the Fifth to the Fourteenth Dalai Lamas exerted spiritual and political power through the Ganden Phodrang institution that they headed in Tibet and later in exile. Now that the Dalai Lama has formally unyoked the political powers from his religious authority,96 he, in his own explanation, returned to the original form of the Dalai Lama institution that was purely spiritual. He assured his Tibetan audience that this did not involve any discontinuation of the Dalai Lama’s bla brang, the Ganden Phodrang. Instead it meant that ‘the political office of the Ganden Phodrang’ (dga’ ldan pho brang gi chab srid kyi ’gan dbang) was put to an end. He nonetheless established that he was a ‘spiritual leader approved by everyone’ (spyi mos yod pa’i chos phyogs dbu khrid), and we can interpret this as his claim to possess a democratic mandate for spiritual leadership. In his speeches, the Dalai Lama has attempted to translate democracy in ways sensitive to his audience’s concerns and understandings of leadership, exile and the future at home or abroad. Over the years, he has developed and refined his translation and, moreover, changed his own role in a Tibetan democracy, which his audience has seen as his creation. We see how his changing translations have permeated political structures and have been written down in the charter. In this manner, governance has been enacted through authoritative speech. Since 1959, we have learned that the Dalai Lama’s dissemination of democracy both constrained and liberated the recipients of the gift. Tibetan exiles were restricted by the definitions of democracy that the Dalai Lama presented, since democracy had become a large responsibility which was placed in

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their hands, but they were also liberated since it was now up to them to determine how democracy should evolve after the Dalai Lama increasingly disassociated himself from the role as the political leader of a Tibetan government. I argue that this is his attempt to alienate himself from the gift. Since the very beginning, he repeatedly pointed out that he never had any proprietary rights over democracy, but that democracy was in the hands of the people. It was ‘the limited knowledge and experience of the public and the elected delegates’97 that had prevented him from dissolving his political office, and he realised that it troubled Tibetans in Tibet and in exile: Being strongly influenced by the Tibetan political leadership system that for nearly 400 years has been directly or indirectly ruled by the Dalai Lama lineage, the Tibetan people and in particular the Tibetans in Tibet, have difficulty imagining a Tibetan people’s political administration that is without the Dalai Lama. Knowing that there is no way that the public will accept it right away, I have thus continuously and from the very beginning worked to strengthen a sense of responsibility among the Tibetans at home and abroad for the past fifty years.98 The Dalai Lama referred to his continuous effort to teach his people the ways of democracy, as well as encourage participation and deliberation, and we have seen several examples of this related throughout this chapter. The Dalai Lama’s downwards delegation of power means that he now can completely retire from political office, as decided at a special session in the Tibetan parliament-in-exile and ratified in May 2011.99 Forty amendments to the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile formally transferred all political powers of the Dalai Lama to the Tibetan parliament-in-exile and the prime minister.100 According to article 1, he is now the ‘protector and symbol of Tibet and Tibetan people’ (bod dang bod mi’i mgon skyabs dang mtshon rtags), having only advisory, non-binding responsibilities as a teacher, motivator and spokesman.101 Thus, the Dalai Lama is not yet completely freed from political responsibility by the Tibetans, as they have inscribed his institution into their charter.

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Now and in the future when the Dalai Lama speaks to the people in the capacity of being a religious head, we can nevertheless expect him to address political issues and talk on the topic of democracy. If we also speculate on the future career of the democracy concept as spoken by the Dalai Lama, an obvious suggestion is that the 2011 devolution of power probably will involve a rupture in his discourse, marking the beginning of a fourth phase in the life of democracy. The question to which we have no answer yet is whether this fourth phase will involve a true disenchantment of the gift of democracy. His translation of democracy also has a ‘runaway effect’102 in that it actively reshapes the terrains in which it is introduced, creating a life of its own, as we continue to discuss in the following chapters.

CHAPTER 2 THE MODEL SETTLEMENT

Although we Tibetans are no more than 140,000 in India, Nepal and Bhutan, we have adapted to the new circumstances of the host nation. We keep alive a culture that to this day is under intense pressure in Tibet, and in danger of suppression, in a land our young generation have not seen. What is it that keeps us going, as guests in a poor country where we must fend for ourselves and be the guardians of a culture that could die unless we maintain it? The secret of our successful adaptation is the settlements, on land leased to us by India over four decades ago.1 Exile is, according to the anonymous author of the CTA Home Department’s self-presentation above, ‘the only way of regaining an authentic Tibetan life’.2 In India, Tibetans were given a place to rehabilitate and rebuild that which was being destroyed in Tibet under Chinese occupation: ‘As refugees, we had to begin all over again, but our desire for a quiet, grounded rural life remained with us.’3 Towards this end, 38 settlements have been established for Tibetan refugees in India since 1960. The settlements have been crucial for their successful survival outside of their homeland. They are what McConnell calls ‘governable spaces’ for the CTA where it can protect and manage its population.4 Ideally, these are enclosures where Tibetans stay together as one community and through their

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isolation and unity become resistant to assimilation and avert losing its people to the host community. The purpose of these settlements has also been to recreate and maintain ‘authentic Tibetan life’ away from Chinese influence and oppression, and so the ideal-typical Tibetan exile is not someone whose culture, customs and identity was lost when she was uprooted from her fatherland ( pha yul). The idealtypical Tibetan is indeed produced in the settlements since it is here that they can preserve culture, maintain the link to the past and live virtuous lives. As McConnell has perfectly put it: ‘[T]his is a population perceived as having a series of interlinked and distinct purposes: as a “resource” which needs to be preserved; as a populationin-waiting ready to return to govern a future Tibet; and as a cultural repository, preserving a unified and essentialised Tibetan national identity outside of the home territory.’5 The model Tibetan citizen is thus the normalising ideal created and sustained through a whole body of governmentality practices.6 The CTA at the political headquarters in Dharamsala has preferred that Tibetan exiles belong to a settlement where Tibetan culture can be contained, and where they can live quiet Tibetan lives as farmers7 and stateless citizens in India.8 The twin settlements of Lugsung Samdupling Tibetan Settlement (lugs zung bsam grub gling) and Tibetan Dickey Larsoe Settlement (bde skyid slar gso) in Bylakuppe, South India, should, in the eyes of the political elite in Dharamsala, serve as role models for other displaced Tibetans since the Bylakuppe settlements are supposed to constitute a reservoir, refuge and safe haven. In Bylakuppe, Tibetan exiles have also been offered opportunities to prove their democratic intent by introducing democracy in local structures, procedures and practices. This implementation of democracy has been on a very local level. It is also in the settlements that Tibetans prepare for their return to the lost fatherland where, ideally, they will create a genuinely self-ruled and democratic Tibet in the future. Thus, the settlement has been perceived as only a temporary order that will be dissolved as soon as they return home. This chapter presents the birth of the model settlement and its internal organisation through the life stories of uprooted refugees in the twin settlements in Bylakuppe. The first part tells the exemplary

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story of dramatic flight from Tibet and the hardships of exile. It shows that the inhabitants of Bylakuppe lead lives that are far from the ideal-type refugee leading an authentic Tibetan life in a seamless society. The settlements are, of course, not enclosed and isolated receptacles for Tibetan lives. They are both imagined and real places, stretching beyond the physical demarcations of its Bylakuppe geography, reaching over and across South Asia to remote satellites of Tibetans located as far away as Switzerland and America, and reaching into webs of connections on the internet. The lives of Tibetans in Bylakuppe have been focused on the struggles of making a living, securing their children’s education and dreaming of leaving India. There may not be much initiative left to become actively involved in politics in order to fulfil higher democracy ideals emerging from Dharamsala, and this had made these Tibetans, in some people’s eyes, poor recipients of democracy. The second part of this chapter maps the ways in which these settlers have organised themselves, partly according to democratic ideals decided upon in the political headquarters of remote Dharamsala. We can see how they relate to the normative translations of democracy and try to deal with this in the way they organise. Indeed, a striking, almost paradoxical observation, is that they circumvent and resist democratic procedures, but also at the same time imagine democracy and call for it. I treat this seeming paradox by introducing van Gennep’s concept of ‘rites de passage’ to analyse the settlement as spatial and temporal liminality. I suggest that this can explain the unavoidable discrepancy between the Dharamsala vision of a model exile state versus real life settlement.

The twin settlements of Bylakuppe Bylakuppe’s twin settlements are a two-hour drive, 87 kilometres to the west, away from Mysore in Karnataka State. It is a drive through what once was jungle, but today has been turned into open fields and plantations. Tibetans often treat the two settlements as a single unit, forming the largest Tibetan colony with 15,000 inhabitants.9 Though commonly referred to collectively as Bylakuppe, the name refers to the name of the Indian village one passes through on the way

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to the settlements. The nearest town, Kushalnagar, is seven kilometres away. The two settlements are spread over a huge area plotted with villages and camps surrounded by maize fields. Many Tibetan exiles still call these villages ‘refugee camps’, although they do not look like places where people are in transit. The settlements of Bylakuppe have become villages organised with a bureaucracy, neighbourhood organisations, healthcare centres, hospitals, old people’s home, cre`ches, schools covering all grades from pre-primary up to 12th grade (SOS Tibetan Children’s Village and CST Bylakuppe with several branches), Tibetan Local Justice Commission, cooperative societies, workshops and businesses (e.g. tractorrepair, noodle factory, flour mills), offices of the administrations, several monasteries, temples and one nunnery. The road from Bylakuppe leads to Lugsung Samdupling, which was the first settlement to be established and referred to as ‘the old settlement’ among the inhabitants, or just shortened to Lugsam. It consists of six camps, each housing about a hundred families. The temporality of the camps and villages is evident in that they are named after the number they have taken in the sequence that they were once built. Camp 1 has a small market, and there are Tibetan restaurants and tea-stalls, lodgings, tailor shops, grocery stores, hairdressers, STD facilities and an internet cafe´. Like other camps, Camp 1 has its own community hall, a temple, a neighbouring school and, not too far away, a monastery. In all, there are seven monasteries in Lugsam covering the four main branches of Tibetan Buddhism. The monasteries Sera Mey and Sera Jey, however, make up their own camp, housing 3,000 monks, with the settlement administration having presented this area to me as ‘the lama camp’. Many of the facilities found in the ‘old settlement’ are shared by those who live in the ‘new settlement’ of Tibetan Dickey Larsoe Settlement, also called Dickey Larsoe. It consists of 16 villages of about 32 families each. The furthest villages, numbers 15 and 16, are situated in Chowkur, 25 kilometres away. Like its twin, Dickey Larsoe also has monasteries and temples, but there is no market as there is in Lugsam, although several villages have a small grocery store and a tea stall.

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The twin settlements have been defined by the government of India as a protected area. This means that apart from the settlement dwellers themselves, Indians and foreigners are not allowed to stay in the settlements. Those who wish to stay there have to obtain a protected area permit from the Indian Ministry of Home. Nobody I spoke with knew why the settlements were protected, but they had numerous suggestions. None of them confirmed the rumour I had heard in Dharamsala that there might be some ‘nuclear things’ going on in the neighbourhood of Bylakuppe. The area certainly did not look like a nuclear waste ground, although it was a bit barren at the time I arrived since most farmers had completed their harvest. Although the two settlements are restricted areas, Indians commonly frequent them in the day time: as day labourers on farms, rickshaw wallas, occasional travelling hawkers and, during the weekends, one or two beggars. The local Indians speak the Kannada language, but several also know Tibetan since they regularly deal with their Tibetan guests or have attended Tibetan schools. Furthermore, the Golden Temple (Namdroling Monastery), in Camp 4, is crowded with Indian tourists sightseeing at the temple in the daytime. Opposite the monastery is a shopping mall with an Indian-run restaurant surrounded by Tibetan shops selling souvenirs, such as key chains and plastic buddhas, made in China. Tibetans living in the urban enclaves of Dharamsala in Himachal Pradesh and Majnu Ka Tilla in Delhi have suggested Bylakuppe as a good place to visit if I wanted to experience a ‘real’ Tibetan settlement. They promised me a settlement in stark contrast to busy Dharamsala and Majnu Ka Tilla. People would have time to talk because nothing was happening in Bylakuppe. They could not promise, however, the Tibetans living there would be able to talk knowledgeably about democracy and political issues. They told me that the people in Bylakuppe were friendly and hardworking, but uninterested in politics. As it turned out, this is not entirely true. If political interest is measured by the extent of what the Tibetans call ‘patriotism,’ then Bylakuppe certainly is a political place. The problem is that in contrast to Dharamsala, there were not many witnesses to the political

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Figure 2.1 Protected area warning outside Sera Jey Monastery. The twin settlements of Bylakuppe are a protected area. This means that Indians and foreigners are not allowed to stay in the settlements unless they have obtained a special permit – as the sign on the picture cautions.

activities taking place in Bylakuppe: there were no tourists, no camera crews making documentaries, no volunteers and no celebrities. This has also meant that the detailed history, organisation and politics of Bylakuppe have not been welldocumented. In addition to the few studies which I am familiar with that have related the historical developments of Bylakuppe,10 in this chapter I will contribute to these historical accounts by, first, adding a more personalised history of Bylakuppe through relating the stories of two Tibetan men, Dorje Damdul and Tsering Palden; and second, introducing a detailed account of settlement life, especially about the organisational structure in these settlements, which, as far as I am aware of, has not been written about previously. The two men, Dorje Damdul and Tsering Palden, represent two common paths to exile and settlement during the

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first wave of Tibetans seeking refuge outside of Tibet in which 80,000 Tibetans settled in South Asia at the beginning of the 1960s.11 A place newly settled Seventy-five-year-old Dorje Damdul welcomed me into his modest home in Village 6 in Dickey Larsoe. His wife Tsering Dolma served sweet tea and helped him with the details of his story when his memory failed him. At 15, Dorje Damdul had joined the Tibetan government army in Lhasa and served as a guard at the Potala Palace, the winter residence of the Dalai Lamas established by the Fifth Dalai Lama. During the uprisings in Lhasa in March 1959, he stood guard at the Tsangpo River and escorted the Fourteenth Dalai Lama to safety in India. At Tsona, the last stop before the Indian border, the Dalai Lama gathered the army and blessed them. Tears were flowing down Dorje Damdul’s cheeks when he retold the Dalai Lama’s message to them: that they had lost their country and he would go to India to seek help; it was useless trying to fight the Chinese army. He advised the men who had helped him escape that they too should leave Tibet. Dorje Damdul was clearly in pain as he recollected this poignant episode: ‘Everybody felt sad’, he said, his voice trembling. The army wanted to go back to Tibet to fight the Chinese forces, so when the Dalai Lama entered freedom in India, Dorje Damdul and other soldiers recovered their steps back into Tibet. When Tibetans heard rumours that the Dalai Lama had escaped, some felt an urgency to leave as well. They believed that they were no longer safe in Tibet and left their villages. This feeling was also shared by Tsering Palden, the second man whose story I now retell. He was 24 years old when he, his wife and seven younger brothers loaded their yaks with their belongings and fled. His caravan of fleeing Tibetans grew gradually as they trekked towards Bhutan. They crossed the border in September 1959, five months after the Dalai Lama had escaped. In Bhutan, Tsering Palden sold the yaks and much of his load. He left his valuables with Bhutanese acquaintances, believing that he would soon return to collect them before making

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the journey back to Tibet when the troubles were over. He bought roasted barley and carried it on his back into India, guided by Bhutanese soldiers. On arrival in India, Tibetans were transferred to refugee camps in Buxa in West Bengal and Missamari in Assam. They were registered and provided with medical assistance, food and temporary shelter by the government of India. At Missamari, 167 children and 65 adults succumbed to the new and harsh living conditions.12 From the temporary refugee camps, Tibetans were sent to road construction sites in northern or north-eastern India. Together with 400 Tibetans, Tsering Palden was sent to Himachal Pradesh. The men received a daily salary of two rupees, while the women received only one rupee and 12 paisa for their road construction work. This was enough for him and his wife to purchase food. In March 1960, while they were in Manali, they heard that the Dalai Lama had arrived at Dharamsala, and they went there to receive his blessings. In front of him they cried and prayed; they prayed for their possible return to Tibet, and the Dalai Lama told them that he did as well. A few months later, the Dalai Lama gave a speech saying that the refugees should leave their work on the roads and settle down. Moreover, the young should receive an education. From Tsering Palden’s group, 50 children were sent to Dharamsala for schooling. The remaining refugees continued the road work, and when one road was finished they were again sent to a new place; they built another road until they were again shifted to yet another place. It was a hard life, and the Dalai Lama was aware of that, so he sent them to South India. He told them to clear the jungle and stay there as farmers, Tsering Palden recalled. Under the Tibetan Rehabilitation Program of the government of India, the first batch of Tibetans was sent to Bylakuppe in 1960 to build a settlement on Karnataka State property, covering 3,000 acres of jungle. Tsering Palden arrived in Bylakuppe in September 1960, one year after fleeing Tibet. They reached their tent camp in the middle of the jungle by a small mud road. They were the first batch of Tibetan exiles in Bylakuppe, and together they built Lugsam, the first Tibetan settlement in India. Dense forest surrounded their tent

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camp; snakes, elephants and wild pigs were their neighbours. Every day they prayed that no animal would harm them. In retrospect they have been convinced that because of the blessings of the Dalai Lama, not many Tibetans were killed by elephants in those days; only four or five Tibetans died, as Tsering Palden recalled. The first batch of Tibetans in Bylakuppe was divided into two groups: one built roads and another deforested. As the men cut back the forest of bamboo, women were set to burn it. They worked hard in the scorching heat from the burning forest, cleared the jungle and built roads to the noise of burning bamboo cracking in the flames. The government of India sent bulldozers and the jungle remains were levelled into fields and tilled. They built houses and divided the land: an acre each meant that a family of five was allotted five acres. During the initial years in exile, Tibetans worked for the government of India at a daily pay of two rupees. Each household in Camp 1, where Tsering Palden lived, was given an ox. They needed two oxen to plough a field, so the neighbours came together and alternated between the fields. The government of India taught them to farm cotton, tobacco and ragi. From 1964 they started working on their own fields. Some Tibetans had good fields and were successful in farming, but other fields produced very little. After three years, they started growing maize. Every family planted maize and it grew tall, attracting wild pigs and elephants. Occasionally elephants roamed in their fields at night and destroyed their crops. Tsering Palden would wake up to the sound of shouting farmers outside with torches trying to chase them away. As road construction and deforesting proceeded, new batches of refugees were sent to Bylakuppe to make new camps. As the first batch had arrived in 1960 and established camp number one, by 1962 they had moved into their new homes. After one year there were six camps in Lugsam. In 1969 the construction of a second settlement, Dickey Larsoe, began. One of the new arrivals at this settlement was Dorje Damdul, the soldier who ten years earlier had escorted the Dalai Lama to India, as related in the story I told at the beginning of this chapter. Dorje Damdul had come straight from the battlefield in Tibet to India. He joined a unit of the Indian

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Army’s border police for ethnic Tibetans and was trained in intelligence service and jungle fighting. He wanted to fight the Chinese, but during his years of service, he was never sent into occupied Tibet. When his health failed him, he left the army and made a new life in Bylakuppe with his wife Tsering Dolma. They felt miserable; there was not enough food and it was difficult to make a living from farming alone. They became dependent, like most other families, on the labour that their four children put into their field and the money earned from seasonal business. It was not until the 1990s that the lives of Dorje Damdul and Tsering Dolma started to take a turn and they felt happy. They have worked hard from the beginning of their time in exile, and it seems like after struggling all their lives, Dorje Damdul and Tsering Dolma, after five decades in exile, still, like so many fellow exiles in Bylakuppe, have not had any rest. Generally it is difficult to make a living as a farmer in Bylakuppe. Most farmers do not have irrigation facilities, meaning they can only sow and harvest once a year, making the agricultural lifestyle vulnerable. Since farming alone cannot sustain them, they usually supplement their income through seasonal business. Some family members go away to do business, while those who remain at home go to school or work in the fields. At the beginning of the season, a family may take a loan from a bank or the person from whom they buy their goods, and then, from October until the Tibetan New Year in February, they travel to Indian cities to sell their products.13 Some families have been unsuccessful and unable to pay back their loans; others can live off their seasonal business income for the rest of the year. The poverty of many farmers is evident. Village 11, one of the last villages to be built, is situated on the outskirts of Dickey Larsoe with fields neighbouring the jungle making it a dangerous area. Inhabitant Pasang Chokpa, who had both wrists broken in an encounter with an elephant, told me that ‘the people are afraid to work on their fields’. Neither the government of India nor the CTA compensate them for what they lose when elephants destroy their crops. There is nothing to do, and the settlers will not be

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relocated: ‘People are helpless.’14 32 houses were built in Village 11, but only 22 families were living there when I visited in February 2007. A rumour has spread that some have even returned to Tibet. The twin settlements were not vibrant and busy when I visited. Several houses were empty and locked up during the business season, or they were permanently vacated because the family has abandoned the settlement, or India, altogether. Especially among young Tibetans, they have increasingly sought opportunities outside of the settlement with some even having moved abroad. It is, therefore, often left to the elders to take care of the maize fields. Some are forced to lease out their land to local Indian farmers or – in the case of land that never yielded much – to leave it untilled. The elders must also look after their vacated neighbours’ home altars: they light the lamps and offer water, and they assemble for prayers on auspicious days in their community hall. Every family in the village has to send a representative to the community hall for the Wednesday prayers, and those who do not show up will have to pay the village a fine of 40 rupees: ‘It is necessary that everybody appears’, Sonam Diki explained, ‘otherwise there will only be five or six people during prayers.’ Not only does it look bad if only a few people are present, but more importantly, the prayers will not be as effective. This does not mean that those who do not participate in the prayers are not religious – ‘they are just busy with their work like everybody else’, as Sonom Diki explained.15 Bylakuppe Tibetans, in their day-to-day struggles and concerns, more than often come short of the ideal-type refugee and democratic citizen. Nonetheless, the exemplary narrative of struggle in exile is important for these Tibetans – they have shown resilience in the face of the struggles as farmers leading ideally authentic lives. However, they often find themselves stuck between the ideal enclosures of the settlement and the attractive ‘real world’ outside the settlement. We see that among the other identities that the settlers in Bylakuppe inhabit, they lead lives not only as farmers, but also as, inter alia, students, emigrants, freedom fighters, monks and returnees.

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Students – becoming Tibetan and building the nation Some families have borrowed money in order to provide their children with higher-education opportunities outside the settlement. The young who are left behind in the settlement are usually school dropouts who, after completing a basic education in the settlement schools, work in the fields or go for seasonal business opportunities. Kesang Tsomo, a 43-year-old civil servant, has worked two jobs in order to provide her four children with education, yet she has not received more than a tenth-grade education herself since her parents ‘did not value it’. They thought that ‘serving the community’ was more important, so they took her out of school. She excused her parents and understood why they once had made this a priority, referring to a well-known message of the Dalai Lama. He opined that it is important to work for society, and likened community service to the performance of religious deeds. Like others of her generation, however, Kesang Tsomo has struggled to provide her own children with higher education, because she believed that education is essential for enabling them to pursue their aims.16 Moreover, it is in the schools that children are usually taught to be Tibetans, patriots and refugees. The teachers have not only been educators, but they have also been ‘nation builders’, as one teacher asserted at the Central School For Tibetans in Bylakuppe.17 A prevailing narrative throughout the settlement has been that a secular, Tibetan mass education with the double responsibility to prevent a loss of culture and provide modern schooling was an idea conceived from a meeting between the newly arrived Dalai Lama and then prime minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru on 24 April 1959. Nehru supposedly made it his personal responsibility to ensure that Tibetan children gained the opportunity to go to special Tibetan schools where they could learn about their history and culture, and at the same time ‘be conversant with the ways of the modern world’.18 The Dalai Lama and the CTA’s Department of Education always spoke in favour of such a two-pronged educational ideal, but the Tibetan education system has nevertheless been criticised for neither equipping the young with

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adequate skills to enable them to compete in the modern world nor being able to provide young Tibetans with an adequate knowledge of Tibetan culture and language. One such critic is Trinle Chodon, a 23-year-old Tibetan writer and university student from Calcutta. Until sixth grade he went to a Christian English medium school, but he was shifted to a Tibetan boarding school because his father had realised that Trinle Chodon would be lost if he was not properly socialised and educated as a Tibetan. In Trinle Chodon’s opinion, the education system had failed in making ‘real Tibetans’, although they have been surrounded by what he called ‘Tibetanization projects’. This was even true for the students who were ‘carefully groomed’ in the Tibetan Children’s Villages. As he explained to me: The very basic idea of establishing separate Tibetan schools and putting in separate religious teachers was to instil Tibetans with not only Buddhist philosophy, but with a stronger sense of Tibetan-ness, and that’s not happening! I don’t feel young Tibetans coming out of Tibetan schools feel more Tibetan than Tibetans coming out of any other school.19 The latest initiative in this nation-building project has been the revival of the Dalai Lama’s educational ideal under the PM Samdhong Rinpoche in 2005, called the Basic Education Policy (btsan byol bod mi’i gzhi rim gyi shes yon srid byus).20 This reformed education model has placed ‘traditional Tibetan education’ (bod kyi srol rgyun shes yon) at its core and defined traditional education as the ‘inner sciences’ (nang don rig pa), which has mainly emerged from Buddhist and Bon sources and considered as having an ‘unbroken lineage’ (brgyud pa bar ma chad), and furthermore, supported by ‘valid reasoning’ (rigs pa yang dag). Traditional education thus included such subjects as Tibetan language, epistemology, art and medicine, all of which have been imparted to exile students using Tibetan language as the teaching medium.21 ‘Modern education’ (deng rabs kyi shes yon), on the other hand, was defined as the sciences that have originated and developed from more recent ‘experiments

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and external investigation’ (dpyad pa dang tshod blta byas pa).22 Modern education therefore included such subjects as science, mathematics, social science, economics, and technology. The overall purpose of this policy has been to preserve traditional Tibetan values, culture, and identity, and to serve as a model for the education policy of future Tibet.23 There has been a general agreement that education is important, but as Trinle Chodon’s criticism above reveals, even Samdhong Rinpoche’s initiative, like those initiated before him, has been challenged by disagreement about what the model Tibetan citizen in a globalised world should be, and how to groom such a citizen. The education of model Tibetan citizens in special exclusive schools has been an important priority in exile, and the majority of Tibetan children in India have attended one of the schools that the CTA’s Department of Education has been responsible for.24 It has not been unusual that the children go to Tibetan boarding schools and live away from their families. Exile has disintegrated many families, but it has also created flexible alternative structures, and emotional bonds between parents and children have not necessarily been severed when they have stayed apart. In any case, family building has been placed with secondary importance; as one young woman said: ‘We are apart from our country. That is more important.’ Families have split up in order to improve their circumstances in hope of a better future; children have been sent for schooling outside the settlement, or even better, they went abroad. Emigrants – between material upliftment and cultural loss One can usually tell which of the settlers have relatives abroad and can therefore benefit from the remittances sent to them: these settlers have grand houses, and some have even sponsored a temple or a community house in their village. In Village 6, however, there were no signs of people who have moved abroad and sent money home to build a large family home, a village temple or new community hall. In this way, Tibetans benefit disproportionately from remittances. Having a family member abroad can improve and change the settlers’ lives dramatically, and many Tibetans work

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hard to prepare for such opportunities, all the while their children become what Ong in a different context refers to as ‘parachute kids’.25 Exile-Tibetan parachute kids are children who are dropped off in another country or at Tibetan boarding schools in South Asia by parents who are living elsewhere in India or abroad. The parents prepare for their children’s future by earning money to pay for their education. Some work overseas accumulating the privileges necessary to re-unite with their families overseas later. Trinle Chodon commented: There is a bunch just behind my house waiting for their visas, doing nothing, just applying for visas, getting rejected, and again their brother, sister, fiance´ are sending money, and they again are applying for a visa. Everybody wants to go abroad. Nobody wants to stay back. Samdhong Rinpoche’s prime concern is that settlements will get empty, you know, that nobody will stay there. But then I don’t mind. I mean, the very idea of establishing settlements was to have the Tibetans together, to preserve that sense of culture, and to some extent it was possible, but I don’t think that’s valid now. You can’t keep them [in settlements].26 The dream of going abroad has spread like a fever within Tibetan communities in India, but it seems to be an ‘elite transnationalism’ more than a real opportunity for the majority. Tibetans discuss the advantages and drawbacks regarding going abroad, and exchange knowledge and rumours on how to get there. It is said that studying nursing, which is very popular these days, might secure a job in the United States easily. Or for nine lakh (900,000 INR) Tibetans born in India can buy themselves a fake identity as a Tibetan from Tibet which will improve their chances of obtaining political asylum abroad. The drawback, however, is that they have to pretend that they have come straight from Tibet, and that demands careful preparations: they have to learn everything about being a Tibetan in Tibet, memorise the opening hours of the shops in Lhasa, study pictures and maps of their claimed hometown,

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make up stories about their childhood, etc. An easier option, hence, is to get married to someone abroad, preferably another Tibetan. It is also interesting to note that it is not unusual that children who are brought up in boarding schools outside the Tibetan community, be it in English-language schools in India, Europe or America, in many cases are sent back to Tibetan communities for re-socialisation. The children of Sonam Topgyal, a school teacher with a political science degree, were born in Scandinavia, but received Tibetan schooling in Mussoorie in order to secure their Tibetan-ness. While he took care of the children in Mussoorie, his wife worked in the United States preparing for a future reunion there.27 Thus, amongst Tibetan exiles, transnationality is not restricted to men (contrary, for example, to overseas Chinese elites explored by Ong28) since both women and men have access to life overseas and work towards this opportunity. Tibetan exiles – women and men – often talk and imagine a different future outside India. Though Tibetans abroad usually have obtained low-status jobs, migration still has been perceived as having value, and upon leaving they can display their successes. Everybody seems to be able to relate to going abroad because their neighbours have left, because they talk on the phone with relatives abroad, witness the successful virtual lives of emigrant Tibetans on the internet, or have heard gossip about life overseas. In this way, there has been an outspoken ‘occidental longing’ in that the West has become a preoccupation.29 However, the imaginations and feelings invoked by the West are complex; going abroad has also become a source of tremendous ambivalence. Usually life abroad has meant material upliftment and the opportunity to amass social capital, but at the same time, there has also been the expressed fear that this mobility has been pulling young Tibetans away from the freedom struggle, leading to a loss of culture and loss of patriotism. This corroborates with Hess’ findings that many Tibetans have clung to the belief that geographical proximity to Tibet and isolation have been important in order to preserve the nation in exile and to regain their homeland Tibet.30

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Freedom fighters – where does patriotism have the best circumstances? Though Tibetans abroad evidently enrich (socially, materially, financially) their families in India, they may nevertheless be accused of valuing money more than the Tibetan freedom struggle. One socalled ‘new arrival’ and MA student in Bangalore commented that because there have been competitions regarding wealth accumulation among Tibetans, they now resemble economic refugees in the sense that they have no ambition except for making money.31 Although Tibetans abroad may be viewed by concerned fellow exiles as abandoning the Tibetan freedom struggle since they emigrate in order to improve their life circumstances, others have recognised that living in an alien environment may benefit the freedom struggle in that it equates with ‘putting wood on your fire’, i.e. increasing one’s patriotism. In fact, one can do more good for the nation from abroad by sending remittances and spreading the message about a free Tibet, as farmer Dorje Phuntsok in Bylakuppe argued: Going to the US is good! They can support their families, and they can learn many new things. Look at the big houses in this settlement! They are all built by money from families abroad. You should have seen the state of this settlement before! If those abroad work for the freedom movement, it is so much more powerful! Just being a Tibetan abroad, people will inquire about you, ask where you are from and give you the opportunity to spread the message.32 If the danger is that one’s perspective becomes less nostalgic and authentic if one lives in the United States, at least it has the potential to be more politically effective. His own daughter, 23-year-old Chemi Dolma, whom I met in 2007, exemplified how being in what she called the ‘real world’ – the world outside of the settlements – can become fertile soil for Tibetan identity, patriotism and political awakening. She left Bylakuppe to go to a multi-cultural boarding school in Tamil Nadu at the age of seven. Leaving the settlement, as she explained, helped her become more interested in her own culture.

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Since she was ‘outside’, Indians asked questions about who she was, and these questions led towards her focus on her background. Chemi Dolma hence concluded that because she did not grow up in a Tibetan community, she became more patriotic. Tibetan youth have often become targets for accusations from peers and elder Tibetans alike of being too preoccupied with money, too lazy, not patriotic enough and not Tibetan enough. At one point, Chemi Dolma complained about the lack of political engagement among her peers, and I had suggested that maybe Tibetan youth were just like any other youth, she responded: ‘We Tibetans have bigger responsibility than others in the world. We are refugees. We have extra responsibility. We are unique. Therefore Tibetan youth have to come together and work as one.’33 Patriotism in this way has become important for most Tibetans. Many parents wish that their children would serve the Tibetan nation by working in the CTA, obey the Dalai Lama, pay voluntary tax, engage in community work, volunteer in organisations and attend rallies; in short, participate in the freedom struggle. The regional branches of the Tibetan Women’s Association (RTWA) and the Tibetan Youth Congress (RTYC), which have become the strongest Tibetan organisations at the settlement level, have also become the main coordinators of the freedom struggle. The organisations have asked their members to volunteer for these activities, but in order to increase the number of participants, they have at times placed a number on how many people should participate from each neighbourhood. For example, there were 19 members of the RTWA in Village 3, and at rallies in Mysore, the village had to send three representatives. The households that had to send representatives to attend a rally were selected on a rotational basis. Each household representative was given 150 INR from the neighbourhood representative to cover their expenses in Mysore. Thus, the well-organised RTWA in Bylakuppe could boast of turning up with 90 women for the rally in Mysore during Chinese President Hu Jintao’s visit to India in November 2006, while RTYC came with 60-strong attendees. There were also villages, such as Village 11, without RTYC and RTWA members. Other villages, like

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Village 9, boasted of a 100 per cent participation in the freedom struggle, because the villagers were members of either RTYC or RTWA. The leader of that village confirmed that it was their duty to leave their work in the fields and go to Mysore for rallies.34 When it came to displaying patriotism, in a few instances I have heard about monasteries which have been criticised by Tibetans for not using their wealth and public relations resources to make an impact in the freedom struggle. Farmer Dorje Phuntsok pointed towards the grand buildings of the monasteries as evidence that the monasteries’ wealth and priorities were not directed towards the freedom struggle. He found the situation ironic, since the freedom struggle had the protection of religion at its core.35 Nevertheless, monks have volunteered for rallies and hunger strikes. When the monasteries in Bylakuppe were asked to send monks to rallies in Mysore, they often sent the number that was expected of them. A secretary at Sakya Monastery, Trinle Chodon, explained how monasteries in Bylakuppe would receive a circular from the settlement administration stating how many monks the monastery should send in proportion to the size of the monastery. They received such circulars two or three times a year. Sakya Monastery would send around ten monks and Tashi Lhunpo around 20 or 30 monks. Monks did express an interest in the freedom struggle, especially those who were from Tibet and who had ‘experienced the hardships under Chinese rule’, as Trinle Chodon concluded.36 Monks – the outside world’s push and pulls A number of monasteries have been re-established in exile, e.g. Sera and Tashi Lhunpo in Bylakuppe. The monasteries have become important providers of rituals, educators and preservers of religious culture, places for worship and sources for personal guidance. Nonetheless, monasticism has not become an attractive option for the majority of young Tibetans as it was in pre-1959 Tibet. It has become difficult for monasteries in India to recruit monks from Tibetan families. Only some of the exile families have a son admitted in a monastery, and monasteries have approached families in order to

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recruit new monks. For instance, among the five sons of Tsering Namgyal, one joined the monkhood at 13 years of age after representatives from a monastery had visited his village and asked the village families if their sons would like to be admitted. Two boys from his village agreed, and from the neighbouring village, three more joined. Tsering Namgyal wanted to send his son to a monastery and was delighted that he accepted this life. However, the majority of the other monks were not from the settlements.37 At Sakya Monastery in Bylakuppe, the majority of the 85 monks come from remote regions of the Himalayas in India and Nepal. 30 monks were ethnic Tibetans, of whom three or four were from Tibet itself, and the rest were from the settlements. In the past, boys were sent to the monasteries at a young age, from as early as four years old. Kelkhang Rinpoche, a young and charismatic religious leader from Tashi Lhunpo Monastery, offered the following explanation during our conversation in 2007: in old Tibet, they would say that at ten a boy’s mind is confident and easy to handle, but if he joins at 18, then he has too much knowledge of the outside world, so he will be uncomfortable at the monastery.38 Before, in old Tibet, it was believed to be compulsory for every family to send a son to the monastery, regardless of the son’s own wishes. Today, however, parents will usually consult their children before sending them to a monastery. Lay man Trinle Chodon, the secretary of Sakya Monastery, confirmed that the boys in the settlement generally prefer a lay, modern education to monkhood. Among the maroon-clad young men in monasteries, only a small percentage was considered to be fully ordained monks (dge slong), most of them were novices (dge tshul). However, Trinle Chodon emphasised that ordination was not decisive, because it was better to have a novice who acts like a ‘perfect monk’ – being good at his studies and having good discipline – instead of having ordained monks who have little knowledge, a bad character and poor discipline.39 The education that the monasteries offered also included some lay subjects, such as English and social science. Trinle Chodon thought that lay education was necessary nowadays, because monks should

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be able to deal with the ‘outside world’. He elaborated upon the problems for the monks in dealing with the ‘modern’ and ‘outside’ world: when monks have vacation from the monastery, they ‘go crazy’ and they do things that they are not allowed to indulge in inside the monastery. On their day off, some monks rent a room to watch television. Some even go to Mysore where they disappear into the big city wearing lay men’s clothes. ‘Surely you must have seen them’, he said to me, and I had – many times. In Sakya Monastery, the monks were not allowed to see their families for the first five years of their stay there. When they finally were able to go on vacation and see their families, ‘that is when we lose them. They never return from vacation.’ Trinle Chodon believed that the modern world was the biggest challenge that these monks faced. They lived under strict rules in the monastery, but became tempted by the outside world when leaving the monastery. Kelkhang Rinpoche explained to me that at 25, monks start thinking more of the outside world, and they may think that it is difficult in the monastery and easy out there. These days the monks have access to ‘modern things’: they play video games, watch television and have access the internet. Hence, Kelkhang Rinpoche opined that ‘the more technology, the fewer monks will be in the monasteries’. It was the choice of the monks themselves, however, to leave the monastery. If they did, they could never return, and the monastery would no longer protect them. ‘Perhaps they think that marriage will protect them’, Kelkhang Rinpoche laughed. Although Kelkhang Rinpoche claimed that very few left his monastery, the monastery secretary Trinle Chodon estimated that about 20 per cent left monkhood because they ‘want to enjoy lay people’s lives’. During my stays in Tibetan communities throughout India, I encountered a lot of gossip about monks violating monastery rules, monks ‘living in luxury’ or ‘acting shameful’. This, among other accusations, has contributed to a critical attitude towards the monasteries. Although the extent to which a process of secularisation has been taking place in the sense of a decline of religiosity among Tibetan exiles is unclear, there were Tibetans who questioned the role that monasteries should play in society.

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Returnees Tibetans in Bylakuppe often imagined a different life from their present everyday life in the settlement, but sustaining the dream about a return to Tibet has become dependent on the younger generations. While their adult children were working and living in ‘the Swiss’ or ‘the States’, the older generations dream of going back to Tibet – free or not. Elder farmers, such as Tsering Palden, Dorje Damdul and Sonam Diki, assured me that the day when the Dalai Lama returns to Tibet, everybody will give up what they have built in exile and follow him. Another farmer in Bylakuppe, 53year-old Gelek Gyatso, put it like this: what Tibetan settlers had struggled to build in 50 years in Bylakuppe, they look forward to give back to their Indian hosts at any moment and return to Tibet. He said: If we gain independence [rang btsan ] then there is nothing that we couldn’t leave behind . . . In general, we are really grateful to India. Grateful to India! We can’t express how happy we were to go to India and to stay in India. We are really grateful to the government of India. If we had our own country, however, then it would be like having our own free country. Those who have their own country have no worries in that way. So, the situation will be different. If we get our own country, then we won’t cling to this house, these fields, the earth that we have farmed – there will be nothing that we won’t gladly leave behind. I won’t say ‘I cannot return.’ There won’t be a single Tibetan staying [in India].40 The dream of repatriation to Tibet was for some Tibetans not dependent upon whether Tibet was free or not. After a lifetime of longing, especially among the first generation of Tibetan exiles, they would like to return to Tibet and die there. For many young Tibetans, however, the dream of leaving the settlement was not based upon nostalgia for Tibet, but a longing to move to the United States. However, the returnee, the emigrant and the stateless in the settlements have become stuck in a temporality that has become

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unbearable, becoming self-conscious about their performances in comparison to the expectations to live quiet lives as authentic Tibetans in isolated communities, organised in democratic ways while preparing their homecoming. We also see this discrepancy between ideals and settlement realities in the following section which maps the ways in which Tibetan exiles have organised themselves and engage with democracy. They have circumvented and at times even resisted democratic procedures, but they have also invoked the democracy discourse in their everyday lives in the settlement.

Order and chains of communication Comparing the model for local democracy prescribed in the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile as to how Tibetans should organise their lives, we see a democratic system that settlement dwellers at times participate in and at other times circumvent.41 With a focus on the twin settlements of Bylakuppe, an introduction to the organisation of settlements and the different positions of authority and leadership follows, including also the chains of communication. Let me first sum up the organisational structure of a settlement. The top position in a settlement is the ‘administrator’ (sa gnas ‘go ‘dzin), who is answerable only to the CTA’s Home Department and the ‘local assembly’ (sa gnas ‘thus mi’i tshogs ‘du) if the settlement has one. The administrator is also the director of the settlement’s ‘cooperative society’ (sa gnas mnyam sbrel), managing the settlement’s handicraft centres or agriculture collectives. Big settlements are organised into smaller communities and neighbourhoods. Dickey Larsoe consisted of 16 villages, each headed by a ‘village leader’ (spyi mi) who was the messenger between the village and the settlement’s administrator. Villages were also divided into four ‘neighbourhoods’ (gzhis grong) each with their own representative called the ‘group leader’ (gzhis grong spyi mi) who was the link between the village leader and the neighbourhood people. For comparison, the six camps of Lugsam had a similar system of community leaders. Every camp

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CTA Dep. of Home

Parliament

Tibetan Women's Association headquarters

SETTLEMENT Local Assembly

Settlement Administrator

Regional President

Executive members of Regional TWA

Cooperative Society

VILLAGE/CAMP Village/ Camp leader

Group leader

Group leader

Group leader

Group leader

Neighbourhood

Neighbourhood

Neighbourhood

Neighbourhood

Neighbourhood representative

Members

Figure 2.2 Organisational structure of a settlement. The two settlements in Bylakuppe serve as examples, and the structure of the TWA is shown for comparison. Bylakuppe has yet to establish a local assembly.

had two ‘camp leaders’, both called brgya dpon, i.e. a master of a hundred homes that form a ‘group of hundred people’ (brgya gshog). Ten ‘group leaders’ (bcu dpon), i.e. master of ten homes, assisted the camp leaders as representatives of their respective ‘neighbourhood’ (bcu gshog, i.e. ‘group of ten’).42 The administration The principle post in a settlement is called ‘settlement officer’ in English. In large, scattered communities like Dharamsala and Majnu

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Ka Tilla, the corresponding position is called the ‘welfare officer’ in English, and constitutes the regional representative of the CTA. The settlement officer or welfare officer, hereafter referred to as the ‘administrator’ following the Tibetan term ‘local administrator’ (sa gnas ‘go ‘dzin), may govern several communities. For example, the administrator in Dekyiling settlement oversaw all Tibetan enclaves scattered around Dehradun. According to article 72 in the charter, Tibetans have the right to democratically elect their administrator among themselves, but only four settlements (out of 39) did this in India.43 There can be several reasons for this, but the main reason has been their preference for appointed rather than elected administrators (as illuminated in Chapter 6), or because they were not able to elect an administrator. For instance, a Tibetan settlement in north-east India, Miao Choephelling, has managed to elect its administrator, but since a candidate had to secure more than 51 per cent of the votes (according to article 73.3 in the charter), the settlement was unable to elect an administrator during the most recent election. Thus, its next administrator had to be appointed by Dharamsala (article 74.1). Most settlements have not even tried to elect their administrator, but preferred that CTA send one from Dharamsala. Usually the administrator has been a man. He was the settlement’s representative of the Home Department in Dharamsala, and therefore functioned as the bridge between the people and the government. All messages and information went through him. These administrators in this way were middlemen, since they dealt with the Tibetan public on behalf of the CTA. The administrative, judicial and relational duties of the administrator have been described in article 77 of the charter.44 Being the person in charge of the settlement, the administrator managed all matters relating to the settlement. He was the one who made the decisions, maintained law and order and nurtured good relations within the settlement and towards the outside. He carried out the instructions from the CTA and oversaw all programmes regarding development, health, education and poverty alleviation within the settlement. It seems that all powers were vested in the

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single post of the administrator. He was the extended arm of the CTA, the president of the cooperative society, the regional election commissioner, the vice-chairman of the school board and automatically a member or the president of all other kinds of boards. As the most powerful Tibetan man in the Dehradun constituency, administrator Damdul Jingkarbon summarised his position: ‘There are so many responsibilities and so many posts together.’45 Settlements also have their own cooperative society (hereafter co-op) that has been registered under the Indian Cooperative Societies Act. It has been headed by the administrator (article 77.5) and a board consisting of members democratically elected among the shareholders, i.e. the people in the villages and camps who were members of the co-op. They have also been the ones who owned the co-op (article 93.19). The purpose of co-ops has been to manage handicraft centres or agriculture collectives in order to sustain the settlement. The two co-ops in Bylakuppe have supplied farmers with agricultural inputs, such as seeds and fertilisers, stored the harvest of the farmers until the market prices turned beneficial and then marketed the products. Co-ops have managed enterprises in order to generate income, helped their shareholders and provided employment. The two co-ops in Bylakuppe have run enterprises such as consumer shops, a tractor workshop, a flour mill, a dairy farm, a handicraft centre, a husbandry programme, a school bus, and the manufacturing of cattle feed, carpets, incense and noodles. In theory, the shareholders should be given the entire profit gained from these enterprises, but there were often cases when the profit has been donated to the Tibetan Freedom Movement. However, this may be interpreted as in accordance with article 93.2 stating that income and profit should be allocated for the welfare of the people. The local assembly A local assembly is supposed to be the bridge between the Tibetan parliament-in-exile and the people in the settlements. Since the rules passed by a local assembly have been implemented by the administrator under the watch of the local assembly, the latter seems

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to have been the only committee or board where the administrator has not been allowed to be a president or member. However, although the local assembly has ‘absolute authority’ (’gan dbang yongs rdzogs) to make decisions regarding the settlement, this can only be done in consultation with the administrator (article 82). Thus, even here the administrator has had a position in the matter. Moreover, the administrator has also been allowed to be present and take part in the meetings of the local assembly, but without a right to vote (article 88). The number of assembly members has varied from seven to 35 depending on the size of the settlement (article 79.1). They have been elected on a three-year basis among the settlement dwellers (article 79.3), and the speaker and the deputy speaker have been elected among the members (article 80). Election of its members has been irrespective of regional or religious affiliation since it would have been, in many cases, impossible to make such distinctions on the settlement level where not all three regions and five religious traditions may be represented. Although article 78.1 in the charter contains the provision that every Tibetan settlement shall establish a local assembly, ten settlements have not been able to do so. In Bylakuppe there has not been a local assembly, but Dharamsala has had one covering not only the town of McLeod Ganj where its office is situated, but also the areas around Dharamsala. This local assembly has run into its fifth term and has 15 members who meet biannually. Out of the 10,000 Tibetans belonging to the Dharamsala constituency, 3,000 voted in the last election according to the president of the Local Tibetan Assembly Dharamsala, Tenzin Kungar. For him, the existence of the local assembly certified that they have achieved democracy.46 The reason given for why not all settlements have had local assemblies has been because the general public so far has not been able to agree on whether they should have a local assembly or not. Today, however, more and more settlements have considered establishing their own assembly. This may be because the CTA and non-governmental actors have made special efforts explaining to Tibetans in the settlements the importance of having a local

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assembly. Bylakuppe has been targeted in this regard, because the government has wanted it to be an example for other settlements to follow. Several informants in Bylakuppe have told me that they have gained a more optimistic outlook regarding local democracy nowadays, and that they expect their settlement to set up an assembly. Tenzin Yonten, the 63-year-old leader of Village 13 in Dickey Larsoe, has recognised that having a democratically elected local assembly was ‘crucial’ (gal chen po).47 He regretted the fact that his settlement had not been able to institute one. Tenzin Yonten explained that ‘because there is no local assembly, the three pillars of democracy are crippled’. Even the prime minister Samdhong Rinpoche, Tenzin Yonten said, had been to their settlement and advised them to establish a local assembly. They had tried before, but there were too many problems and people could not agree, so they never established one. Such is often the case with establishing democracy: the majority decided not to have a local assembly. It was far from all the community leaders in Bylakuppe who declared themselves proponents of democracy like Tenzin Yonten, or even understood what a local assembly entails. One camp leader in Lugsam, when asked about the local assembly, replied with a confused ‘What is local assembly?’ (sa gnas ’gro tshogs ga re red). When I told him the English term and explained it, he still did not know what it was, and he dismissingly said that they did not have such a thing in the settlement.48 Tenzin Yonten believed that eventually they would establish one when people had become aware of its importance. Community leaders When a settlement consists of only one village, like Sonada Tibetan Settlement outside Darjeeling that only has about 250 inhabitants, the administrator has been the authority who handles all administrative, judicial and relational duties. In big settlements comprising several camps or villages such as in Bylakuppe, or blocks such as in Dekyiling, the administrator has had local leaders working under him. These leaders have dealt with the community face to face. In Bylakuppe, they have been democratically elected for one year

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starting 1 April, and their duties have become so extensive that it has almost become a fulltime job. A village of Dickey Larsoe serves as an example of the organisation at the very local level into several neighbourhoods: two roads cross and divide the village into four neighbourhoods that have been headed by group leaders working as the messengers between the people and the village leader. Other settlements may have used other terms for these positions, but in this case, a ‘neighbourhood’ (gzhis grong) refers to a cluster of usually eight families, amounting to 32 families in each village. They have lived either in a ‘house for ten’ (bcu khang) or ‘house for five’ (lnga khang). Where the four neighbourhoods meet, there was usually a community hall on one corner, and in the middle of the intersection a prayer flag would be fluttering in the wind. This is also where the inhabitants of the village would meet for brief and informal meetings. The first time I met Sonam, the leader of Village 3, I could see him standing in the middle of the village intersection with four big sacks. People were coming from all directions, gathered around him and squatted down right in the middle of the road, sitting there on the ground. Sonam had called for a meeting in order to distribute his sacks of ‘religious offerings’ (’tshog) to all families in the village. The intersection where they gathered was actually just outside their brand new community hall, but ‘they had always met in the middle of the intersection, at that specific point’, the neighbourhood representative Deden Nyima explained. The new community hall that the villagers had built was only meant for prayers, so they held their meeting in the street: ‘It was just a brief meeting anyway’ she added.49 For comparison, each of the six camps of Lugsam had about a hundred families, so every camp has had two camp leaders. Though two persons have shared the responsibility as camp leader, they have both been called ‘a master of a hundred homes’ (brgya dpon) which form a ‘group of hundred people’ (brgya gshog). Ten ‘group leaders’ (bcu dpon), i.e. master of ten homes, have assisted the camp leaders as representatives of their respective ‘group of ten’ (bcu gshog). Most settlements have been organised into smaller units like these, whether they have been called neighbourhoods, courtyards, groups or

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blocks, each having their own group leader working under the leader of the camp or village (hereafter referred to as camp leader), who in turn has worked under the administrator. The group leaders have had fewer responsibilities than the camp leader since they have not had to deal with any offices outside their neighbourhood, but they have assisted the camp leader when needed. Furthermore, while it has been the norm that households take turns in sending a representative of the family to act as a group leader, the camp leader has been appointed by the camp through elections so as to create a sense of democracy. A person who is considered to be honest and hard-working, and who has been perceived as having a concern for the society as a whole, has often been chosen. The inhabitants of Village 11 jokingly told me that a camp leader should have ‘chicken feet’. That is to say, if one has light feet, one can quickly move here and there, wherever and whenever one is asked to come. Villagers often did not campaign or compete for the post as camp leader. During elections, people may stand up and beg the others ‘please do not vote for me’, and the others will elect him despite his pleas for the opposite. It has also become very common that the post rotates between a few households. Moreover, the position of a camp leader, although it has become a post that, according to the rules, must be filled through democratic election, in practice has become something one may inherit from a family member or even from a neighbour. The reason has often been that many villagers have left the settlements during the winter for business. Furthermore, the camp leader has never been a woman, unless she has inherited the post from her husband or a son. One example is Sonam Diki who acted as the leader of Village 6 because she stood in for her son while he was away on seasonal business. On previous occasions, she also stood in for her son as camp leader in 1984, 1996, 2004 and 2006. Sonam Diki argued that she knew how to read and write, so she could handle her responsibilities.50 Camp leader responsibilities The camp leader has often been the connection between the villagers, the administrator and the co-op, and has carried out instructions.

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Although the camp leader has been the boss who would handle most issues, a camp leader could not be considered a ‘master’ (dpon po), but was considered to be more like a ‘servant’ (g.yog po), as camp leader Tsering Tashi jokingly said. This was because he has been there to serve the people and had many responsibilities.51 The camp leader has been in charge of arrangements, such as meetings and visits (e.g. MPs and organisations). For instance, during my month-long stay in Camp 1, the inhabitants met in the community hall to hear a recording of the Dalai Lama at the Kalachakra teachings in Amaravati 2006. In his speech, he spoke in favour of vegetarianism and spoke against wearing fur. At the meeting in the camp, an animal rights organisation from Mysore advocated vegetarianism and distributed information on the topic. It has also been the camp leader who distributed work, for example work requested by the administrator. He has also been in charge of acquiring the seeds and fertilisers from the co-op when it was time to sow. In villages that have had a collectively farmed field, the village leader would often ask each ‘house for five’ (nga khang) to send a family member and he would distribute the work. Leaders of camps and villages would also make sure that every family sent one member to the local temple or community hall to observe Wednesday prayers, prayers on auspicious days and the yearly month-long prayers. If the village or camp had a system of fining families who did not send a representative to these compulsory prayers, the leader was also in charge of keeping the accounts. The camp leader has also had the authority to settle small disputes, such as quarrels between neighbours or within families. Moreover, camp leaders often looked after the welfare and financial wellbeing of the households, and all poverty-alleviation programmes (scholarships for education or financial help) were in his care. He also often ensured that the elders were taken care of, either by recruiting other villagers to help them in their homes or by accommodating them in an old-age home. Smaller welfare tasks, including organising neighbourhood night-watchman schemes, overseeing problems regarding water, lights, cable TV etc., were also placed as one of his responsibilities. Some of the more well-off camps have gained sources of income. For

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instance, Camp 2 has made profit from its five-acre land and ‘cable disk’ (a TV service for which they collect 500 rupees per family). Acting as a bridge between the people to the administrator and the co-op, the camp leader has also played the important role of a messenger. Tenzin Yonten, leader of Village 13, presented to me a letter that he had received from the settlement administration. When he received such a message, he evaluated how important it was. If he deemed it to be very important, he convened a village meeting to convey the message; if it was unimportant, he appointed a person to walk from house to house to spread the word. That person had to make sure all families received the message within one week.52 For messages sent the other way, from the people to the leadership, the camp leader in many cases would act as a gatekeeper more than a messenger. The camp leader would often not present individual cases, but had the power to decide whether a family could present its case to the administrator. Without the village leader’s signature, the villagers did not have a case. Thus, leaders of camps and villages have obtained great powers and responsibilities. When it came to larger issues concerning the entire society, there were different versions of how the chain of communication from the grassroots to Dharamsala has worked, and it is doubtful whether the camp leader has voiced the concerns of the people and made sure they have been heard in the local administration or in Dharamsala. In policy-making issues, the administrator would often ensure that the inhabitants were informed of policies made in Dharamsala. Conversely, the settlement dwellers and their community leaders were unsure about whether their opinions would be carried the other way. Tenzin Yonten told me that when a policy like the organic farming scheme emerged from Dharamsala, the administrator would convene the inhabitants, announce the policy and let the people voice their opinions.53 Since the administrator works for the Home Department, he was responsible for conveying the people’s opinions to the department. Seventy-one-year-old farmer Ngawang Chophel, who had acted as a camp leader for many years, lamented that the CTA only listened to what they had to say after the decision had already

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been made in Dharamsala. Moreover, he added, the CTA officials would, on their side, make sure that the voice of the government was heard: They held meetings, informed and explained the new policy on organic farming and arranged workshops. In other words, the farmers in the villages were not given agendas to discuss, but were presented with already-made decisions. In this sense, they could not influence the government, but the government is thought to do its best to influence them, as Ngawang Chophel concluded.54 Pema Thinley, the editor of the Tibetan Review, supported this observation on the top-down government and criticised the fact that people at the grassroots level were informed of decisions, but not given any opportunity to deliberate on them. He told me: The reality is that in the case of many major decisions, the decisions come from above. People below discuss it not with the point of view to object or criticise or change it, but as a manner of seeking approval. But if you give people the agenda and you discuss it amongst yourselves and then give the final outcome or decision or resolution through the higher authorities, that would be another manner. Like in the case of organic farming and the Middle-Way, these are all decisions from above. People below are educated on it, suggestions are elicited, but not with a view that they should criticise and reject if they feel that way. So it’s all overcoming top-down, you know, top-down kind of democracy.55 Bylakuppe is geographically far from the political centre, but Dharamsala has nonetheless a presence there. The policies have been decided in Dharamsala and implemented in the settlements. It has been the administrator who has overseen this work, and who has represented Dharamsala in the settlement. The extended arm of Dharamsala into the neighbourhoods has often been the camp leader. The camp leader position has become powerful, but a few people have been concerned about the ability and the engagement of these leaders. They have accused the camp leaders of having a lack of knowledge

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and interest, of being unable to carry their responsibilities and not taking the full extent of their powers seriously. The duty to secure help to poor people has often been raised as an example by those Tibetans who criticise the state of local democracy. The camp leader, knowing his community, knows who is actually poor out of all the people claiming to be in need of financial support. As the accusations state, it has not been the needy who have been the ones receiving help. Thus, the camp leaders, critical voices have asserted, have not been able to represent the people, which in essence has been the duty they have been democratically elected to fulfil. I will return to this in Chapter 5.

Caught in-between The present chapter’s ethnographic account of a place, a people, and an order has introduced the local domain constituted by the settlements and its inhabitants who have been recipients of democracy. Relating a model settlement, I have not dealt with Tibetan exiles living outside of, or in disagreement with, the political order established by the CTA. Instead, I have presented a model settlement inhabited by model Tibetan exiles, similar to what Malkki has called the ‘essential refugee’.56 There has obviously been an idealisation of a settled and bounded community, where democracy has been practised and proven on the ground. The settlement has been at the heart of the exile’s two-pronged project of continuing the Tibetan nation in exile, as related in the first part of this chapter, and democratisation, i.e. the modernisation of organisation and governance as told in the second part of this chapter. These two strategies have been directed towards the overall official goal of homecoming. It has nonetheless become obvious that conflict has been inherent in this project, and I conclude by setting van Gennep’s concept of ‘rites de passage’ as a frame in order to unpack this contradiction.57 Van Gennep’s concept of rites de passage has been used to determine transition rites commemorating stages of life. He has identified in these rites a pattern of three phases which mark shifts

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from one status or social world to another: separation, liminality and incorporation. It is through the mediating period between two states, coined with the concept of liminality, which I argue captures the discrepancy between the Dharamsala ideal and Bylakuppe real. The wider use of the concept of liminality, moreover, maintains that there are key characteristics of transition: it is temporary and involves a long series of ordeals. The participant is usually isolated and wrapped up in taboos, prohibitions and strict rules of conduct, because the participant is outside established categories during this phase. Liminality is also a dangerous phase, because of the possibility that the person who is ‘in-between’ will reject reintegration and will become lost. The result can be homelessness and anomie, instead of entering the third and final stage in which the transformed person returns home and enters society anew. The potential of van Gennep’s concept was not only recognised by Turner, who made it into his own by introducing the phrase ‘betwixt and between’, but it has also been incorporated into refugee studies, such as those of Malkki on Hutu refugees in Tanzania.58 Tibetan settlements in India can also be described as spatial and temporal liminality, I argue. We have seen how the exiles have been torn between everyday life and concerns in the Bylakuppe settlements, and the ideal, functional and normative concerns emanating from Dharamsala where policies and guidelines have been produced. Living an ideal is impossible, and their own ideal has not necessarily been to live quiet lives as ‘authentic Tibetans’ organised in democratic ways while preparing their homecoming. Moreover, the settlement is ideally an isolated, enclosed and semi-autonomous territory sustained as a container of Tibetan-ness and as a safe haven for the stateless Tibetan. Tibetan identities have been negotiated in the model settlement which has been a place built on leased land by hard-working refugees who at any time are prepared to drop their work, give the land back to their hosts and return to Tibet. Similar to rites de passage that in many cases entails endurance tests in which the participant must prove himself worthy of the new status, the narrative of building the settlements through exemplary hardship, as illustrated in the tales of the two Tibetan men Dorje Damdul and

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Tsering Palden, has been essential for shaping the identity of an uprooted Tibetan exile with a rightful claim to the ‘fatherland,’ pha yul. It also reminds us of Malkki’s observation of how Hutu refugees’ perception of themselves has been produced in the Tanzanian refugee camp where they saw exile as a test before regaining their homeland.59 We have seen that the inhabitants contrast the settlement to the ‘real world’ outside of the settlement: monks dream about the real world of lay people’s pleasures, emigrants of the real world abroad and students experience the pull of Westernisation while being educated as ideal-type refugees. For these Tibetans, it is as if they do not believe in the ideal of the settlement; it has become a fiction. In fact, the settlements have been unable to keep the people within its order of camps and villages: they leave. Otherwise, the inhabitants have been stuck in this in-between phase, or liminality, of the settlements in which they must prove themselves worthy of homecoming by enduring the hardships of exile as stateless refugees living authentic lives. But the release has failed to happen. Similarly, the procurement of democracy on a local level has also been unresolved. Bylakuppe should have become a pioneer in democracy, but has been wrestling with this ideal when faced with, for instance, electing their own administrator and establishing a local assembly. Sometimes it has also been difficult to find someone new to promote to the position as a camp leader in a democratic fashion, so the ideal of democracy has not always been sustainable but at times must be circumvented. The Tibetan settlement should stand as a bounded community formed by Tibetans united in a common cause, and the inhabitants must prove that they maintain this state of liminality. They have understood themselves to be in a state of transition, and that has been how many understand their democracy as well: it is transitional, because they are not there yet; they are not fully democratic yet. At the same time, they have not yet moved back to Tibet, so this double transitional stage has certainly become a ‘betwixt and between’ state of affairs. Not only has the inclusion into a third phase of van Gennep’s continuum not happened, but in many cases the

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third phase has become blurred. Is it a return home to Tibet, a search for opportunities in the United States or obtaining citizenship in the host country? Homecoming, it seems, has now become individually defined. Liminality can only be sustained if there is a clear goal and limited time. It is a phase that is impossible to live with. Tibetans have been caught in an enduring transition, and they have started to question whether this is a transition towards Tibet. Perhaps they have become stuck. Perhaps liminality has become permanent. Like other political exiles, the hope of return may erode in due course, and temporality may feel like permanence.60 The in-between-ness has become a source of meaninglessness, and the revolutionary and hopeful spirit has often been replaced by frustration and disinterest.

CHAPTER 3 DHARAMSALA DEMOCRATS AND ORGANISATIONS

The last of the three domains explored in the context of the development of democracy among Tibetans-in-exile is the civil society domain. Civil society has come to occupy the role as a significant ideal in democracy studies. It has been perceived as something positive and desirable, as the sine qua non for the development of democracy, and it is understood to play important roles in the prelude to the breakthrough of democracy and its consolidation.1 For civil society agents in India and throughout Asia, the predominating understanding of civil society has been the neoTocquevillian ideal in which civil society denotes networks of independent grassroots associations mediating between the state and the family, and performs crucial social and political functions underwriting democracy.2 Mosher has, in a more general context, called this positive view of civil society the ‘entrenchment model’, in that it highlights how civil society impacts value-diversity and works as a counterweight to the establishment.3 Civil society, in general, seems to have poor conditions in Asia. If it exists at all, it resembles what Mosher has otherwise referred to as the ‘transmission belt model’, which highlights how civil society is inhabited by intermediary actors who faithfully transmit dominant, singular values, and who work to perfect themselves after the ideal of the transmitted value, neither adding nor subtracting anything to the

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transmitted.4 In contrast to studies that argue over whether or not there is a ‘true’ civil society in Asia and point to the apparent imperfections in the different civil society models, my study takes as the point of departure that there is no escape from the civil society ideal – as a concept it has already been circulating and put into action in Asia. The exile-Tibetan cases presented in this chapter, moreover, unfold how Tibetan civil society actors in India seem to apply both models, either the entrenchment or the transmission belt model, in order to best serve their political cause. On the one hand, they wish to work in tandem with the CTA towards a common goal as a mediator of shared values, similar to the transmission belt model: on the other hand, they also wish to nourish diversity and plurality, similar to the entrenchment model in which the actors represent a plurality of diverse values working as a barrier against concentrations of power. When we look at the exile-Tibetan particularities and how civil society agents view themselves and organise, we see that the actors that populate the exile-Tibetan civil society domain apply the neoTocquevillian understanding of the civil society and, moreover, that these agents are very conscious about performing this neoTocquevillian ideal, but also that their translations of civil society in a democracy in exile has additional, culturally specific referents. For Tibetan exiles living in India, the multitude of organisations and groups that work on a platform which they refer to as ‘civil society’ has acted separately from the state platform from where they identify that the CTA and the Dalai Lama work. The CTA is actually a nonstate, normative domain for a freedom movement in exile not a state body, although it aspires to be exactly that.5 In fact, in relation to civil society, the CTA is a proxy state towards which exile-Tibetan democrats and organisations have to relate. Frechette has compared the Tibetan freedom movement in exile to building a diaspora state.6 It is a ‘state-in-the-making’ in that it consists of a people, control over a territory in the sense of relatively autonomous settlements and a government that has the capability to enter foreign relations.7 The CTA stands in for the state, and the project that Tibetans have embarked upon is a democratic ‘state-in-the-making’ project. This chapter will furthermore unfold two characteristics of democrats and

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organisations in Dharamsala: that they have taken upon themselves the civil society ideal and have become significantly self-conscious performers as civil society actors in a modern democracy; and that they perform this role in an explicit relation to the CTA that here works as a proxy state. This chapter addresses the associational life in Dharamsala, the seat of the Tibetan exile community and the CTA, the initiatives and partners which have been established to build democracy, and the infrastructure which extends into the settlements and scattered communities throughout India. I treat civil society as a sphere, a site and an actor as defined by Alagappa, in which it is ‘a distinct space for organisation by nonstate, nonmarket groups; a site for communication and discourse; a site of governance; and a means to influence the structure and rules of the political game’.8 Furthermore, I do not treat Tibetan civil society as a monolithic, single collective actor or the mere sum of Tibetan organisations and groups that exist in India. Instead, I align myself with Alagappa when he warns: ‘The tendency to use civil society in a shorthand fashion may mask the diversity, inequality, and struggle within the realm. Analytically, it is more useful to speak in terms of specific actors or groups of actors in civil society.’9 Thus, I investigate the agency of three actors in the multi-layered process of translating democracy – three initiatives that have adopted the civil society ideal and have participated in the democratisation process: The Tibetan Youth Congress, Tibetan Women’s Association and Youth for Better MPs or Youth for Better Democracy. I do not highlight the spectacular activism of these groups that have been covered by the media and through which they have received their reputation outside of India, but instead focus on the ordinary ground work of influencing the democratisation process in various ways. The Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC) is the biggest Tibetan organisation in exile and has clear political stances regarding how to adequately organise in a democratic fashion, responding critically to the work of the CTA, even at times suggesting changes to its political platform and organisation. The Tibetan Women’s Association (TWA) has not presented alternative policies to the CTA regarding democratic organisation in the way the TYC has done;

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instead, it has supported and contributed to the consolidation of the present democratic process and institutional set-up. It has focused on empowering Tibetan women and organising them at the local level in settlements, providing Tibetan exiles with opportunities to obtain hands-on experience with democracy. The last case is an informal adhoc initiative which calls itself Youth for Better MPs (YBMPs) or Youth for Better Democracy (YFBD). This network of young Tibetans has made its own campaigns to secure what they deem to be good candidates for the elections of the parliament-in-exile and prime minister. In other words, with a focus on their initiatives to support, negotiate and further develop the project of democratisation, this chapter looks into how these organisations have dealt with the gift of democracy, and how they imagine it to be in the future.

Organisational life Dharamsala is a special place since it has become the headquarters of the freedom movement. In the next section, I will give an overview of the blossoming organisational life evident in Dharamsala, and show how the organisations have positioned themselves in relation to the ideals that are purported by the CTA and the Dalai Lama which have thoroughly permeated the work and self-image of these organisations. Mostly, the organisations introduced below have conformed in one way or the other to official goals which have been declared by the Dalai Lama to be important in exile: freedom struggle, continuation of national identity, education, and development of democracy. Furthermore, they have also categorised themselves as either political or cultural organisations: by enhancing how they are vehicles for preserving tradition and keeping up national spirits (but nonetheless work for the Tibetan cause, if only indirectly) or by enhancing their explicit political character and contribution in the freedom struggle. Situated in the Himalayan foothills of Himachal Pradesh, around 8,000 Tibetans live in Dharamsala, the political and cultural capital of the Tibetan exiles. The name Dharamsala usually refers to the entire area where Tibetans have settled, yet it in fact refers to the name of the Indian town situated in the Kangra valley. Most Tibetans

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live nine kilometres above Dharamsala in the busy hill station of McLeod Ganj, where a growing number of organised Tibetans have set up their headquarters. Tibetan exiles are also housed in the neighbouring enclave Forsyth Ganj and further down the hill in Gangchen Kyishong where the CTA offices are situated. Dharamsala is a unique place, unlike any other Tibetan enclave in India. It is a mixed society where Tibetans live as neighbours to Indians of different ethnic and religious backgrounds, such as the local Gaddis, the Kashmiri businessmen and the servant boys from Bihar. It is also a noisy and busy tourist magnet attracting visitors from around the world. In recent years, Dharamsala has been visited by an increasing number of Indian tourists, especially from neighbouring Punjab; semi-rich families, honeymooners, groups of friends and schoolchildren on excursions arrive daily. These Indian visitors generally wish to see the Hindu sights in nearby Bagsunath, and they come to enjoy the beautiful landscape and peaceful setting which is not as common in other popular tourist locations in India. There are also a multitude of international visitors to the area: adventurous trekkers resting a day or two before climbing a nearby mountain; numerous foreign pilgrims who come to the area to visit Hindu or Buddhist sites; dharma practitioners going for Buddhist teachings and retreats; American high school students on exchange programmes; and well-wishers who volunteer as English teachers or donate money to Tibetan refugees. Dharamsala is also a popular location for students and scholars doing research on Buddhology, Tibetology and anthropology originating from Europe, America, Taiwan, etc. The diversity of Tibetans living there is another aspect which makes Dharamsala stand out from the other Tibetan enclaves in India. One group of Tibetans can be classified as the Tibetans who came before the 1980s and their children. Many of these Tibetans and their relatives work in an organisation or in the CTA, and others take part in the thriving business sector. Another group can be classified as the Tibetans who arrived after the 1980s, and are often referred to as the ‘new arrivals’ (gsar ’byor) by other exiles. Many of these Tibetan exiles have travelled from Tibet to Nepal, and are then taken to the

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reception centre in Lower Dharamsala where they often stay for a month or so until they are sent to monasteries or schools throughout India. Many of these ‘new arrivals’ even return to Tibet after they have received an audience with the Dalai Lama, and their children have gained admission into the much sought-after Tibetan Children’s Village boarding school above McLeod Ganj. The past couple of decades have also seen a newer group of male East Tibetans seeking better opportunities in India or abroad. There are many ‘connections’ in Dharamsala to help these young men leave India: many Tibetans already have family abroad and thus the necessary networks for emigration; they seek out potential or actual sponsors; and they even at times become involved with Western women who they can marry. In Dharamsala, these opportunities, including family networks, sponsors and marriage can be sought after for realising the goal of going abroad to earn money. A Tibetan friend once commented that it was ironic that the Tibetans who actually grew up in Dharamsala were now living in the West. Dharamsala has also become the political headquarters of the Tibetan exiles and their freedom movement. The new arrivals, the various civil society organisations, the CTA, media and outside observers can all be located in Dharamsala. Moreover, twice a year all Tibetan parliamentarians gather there when they meet for the biannual parliamentary sessions. Rallies are frequent, and the level of organised youth is high. During my stays in Dharamsala, there were conferences, festivals, workshops, lectures, meetings, a return march to Tibet and a ‘non-violent direct action’ training camp for Tibetan freedom fighters. There were also recruiting sessions before campaigns: activists visited settlements, schools, monasteries, cafe´s, and so forth, asking volunteers to join demonstrations in Delhi at the risk of beatings from the Indian police or spending a number of days in jail. Political gatherings take place elsewhere as well, but in Dharamsala they are frequent, and the political atmosphere can be tense. I attended and documented many demonstrations against human rights violations in Tibet, political anniversaries, campaigns for freeing political prisoners in Tibet, and candlelight vigils for commemorating Tibetans shot at the Sino-Nepali border or Tibetans

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who had self-immolated in East Tibet. McLeod Ganj was also a scene for political street theatre, a few documentary productions and a Gangnam-style parody on the Chinese President Xi Jinping.10 Once I was invited to help with preparations for a political rally. I spent three hours at the TYC headquarters writing the English-language slogans that they placed orders for, such as: ‘China stop the patriotic re-education campaign in Tibet now’, ‘Free Tibet’, ‘Freedom of religion, freedom of worship, freedom from China’, and ‘Stop religious suppression in Tibet now’. At the demonstration, their demands were voiced in English, Tibetan, as well as in Hindi. Many Tibetan exiles are engaged in an organisation, and in Dharamsala these organisations are thriving. Pema Gyal, a 29-yearold who is one of the principal organisers of Youth for Better MPs, is one example of a Tibetan youth who for years has been passionately engaged in the Tibetan freedom struggle and has actively used the

Figure 3.1 Demonstration in Dharamsala, October 2006, to protest and commemorate the shooting of a Tibetan nun at the Tibetan –Nepali border on 30 September 2006.

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civil society platform of organisations – first he was active in the TYC and later in Students for a Free Tibet. He believes that the few Tibetans who are politically engaged and are willing to take leadership have the responsibility to encourage the masses and drag them into creating a movement. Raised in Dharamsala, he was constantly reminded that India was not his home, and he was continuously inspired to work for the Tibetan cause.11 While politically engaged youth, such as Pema Gyal and other role models in Dharamsala, find that they are ‘born political’, as he called it, with a special responsibility as political exiles, this was more the exception than the norm. The level of the exiles’ political awareness and engagement varied, which became obvious when talking to leaders and members of various exile organisations. Those who held positions within the Dharamsala-based central leadership of organisations were often well-versed in the political rhetoric, and they often spoke within well-known political discourse as if they had been trained within the neo-Tocquevillian ideal. They were eager to promote their cause and were conscious about their own performances as civil society actors who were concerned and responsible representatives of their organisations and the Tibetan cause. Ordinary members, on the other hand, usually did not promote any particular political viewpoint, and they did not seem to have much knowledge about the democratisation process. During rallies for free Tibet, however, many hundreds of Tibetans would show up. Most Tibetan exiles, moreover, seemed to have an affinity to at least one organisation, whether it was a formal association, a social club or a network. I have to a certain extent engaged in field research among all of the below-mentioned organisations, the experiences of which will provide the basis of the following discussion. Several organisations in Dharamsala have positioned themselves as important vehicles for preserving tradition and keeping up national spirits rather than as agents for change: some Tibetan exile organisations have been directed towards specific sections of the population, such as the ‘new-arrivals’ (gsar ’byor) catered for by organisations like Lha and Tibet Charity; substance-abuse

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problems were dealt with by the organisations AAA and Kunphen; former political prisoners were given shelter and education at GuChuSum; animal rights and pro-vegetarianism organisations such as Semchen have also emerged; and, of course, there were also sport clubs. Some organisations catered to well-wishers from abroad by organising volunteer work, for example VolunteerTibet. Furthermore, several organisations were involved in improving relations between Tibetans and their Indian hosts, such as Bharat Tibbat Sahyog Manch, Himalaya Parivar, India Tibet Friendship Society, and Friends of Tibet. These India-focused organisations were important for generating support among their hosts and neighbours. In emergencies, these organisations were also often mobilised to solve disputes and problems in the settlements. It is striking that even among groups that perceive themselves as non-political, such as Longsho which taught young Tibetans how to perform traditional dances, rituals and so forth, many of these organisations nonetheless work for the Tibetan cause, if only indirectly. Exile-Tibetan trade organisations, for example, participated in the freedom struggle by selling their products in bags which said ‘Free Tibet’ or by organising strikes. Even social networks such as students’ organisations and mutual-aid societies (skyid sdug) showed commitment to the Tibetan freedom struggle. The latter were important collectives of people that, in most cases, were based on regional origin, and therefore could be seen as home-district organisations. They chiefly functioned as social welfare groups that ‘help their own’ and gathered Tibetans for picnics, folk dances, and marriages, as well as for supporting each other during old age and illness.12 The most common mutual-aid societies that were not based on regional affiliation were the funeral organisations (mi shi skyid sdug) and societies formed by retired soldiers (dwang zur skyid sdug). The small mutual-aid societies functioned like social clubs and claimed that they did not represent any political interest, but this was not entirely true. Some home-district organisations were organised under umbrella organisations (e.g. Ngari United Association), which were directly engaged in politics, for example endorsing their

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candidates before PM elections and even campaigning for specific candidates. Furthermore, there are many political organisations in Dharamsala. In fact, the largest Tibetan exile organisations were steadfastly directed towards the freedom struggle. In 1972, the Tibetan Freedom Movement (bod rang dbang bden pa’i las ’gul tshogs chung) was established in Dharamsala to generate finances for the exile administration. Its regional branches collected revenue known as the ‘voluntary tax’. Chusi Gangdruk, once the East Tibetan guerrilla movement fighting Chinese aggressors, has developed into a regional association and mutual-aid society with strong political interests. Other Tibetan exile organisations whose main purpose has been the freedom struggle, such as TYC, TWA, GuChuSum and Students for a Free Tibet, have been accused of not catering for the Tibetan exiles and being too focused on the international community. In order to attract media attention, generate international support and gather Tibetans behind the banner of ‘Free Tibet’, they have arranged rallies, hunger strikes, demonstrations, peace marches and the like. Despite different political stances regarding independence versus autonomy, these organisations have often taken joint action in the freedom struggle, and in 2007 ahead of the Beijing Olympics, they joined forces in what they called a ‘mass-movement’. Another aspect of associational life is that of the Tibetan exile organisations which commonly perform social and welfare work. In this manner, they relieve and support the CTA that is unable to reach all Tibetan exiles financially and practically. Whether it is to organise elections, convey messages from the CTA, collect and distribute funds, provide ‘new arrivals’ with skills, training and employment or organise help for the elderly, these organisations like the TYC and TWA have in fact provided services that one would expect from democratic governments, in the meantime contributing to the output legitimacy of democracy. As Kesang Dekyi, an active member in Dopa HomeDistrict Association in McLeod Ganj, remarked: Basically people live good lives because the Tibetan government really looks after our wellbeing. Nonetheless, the

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respective home-district organisation looks after the small matters that somehow are not handled by the government. So, for clearing up small problems that we face in our day-to-day life, we established this home-district organisation.13 MP Karma Yeshi, who once had been an executive member of the TYC, explained that the local leaders of organisations form a ‘social wellbeing community’ or a ‘decision-making body’ that resolves local issues, although there was nothing in writing that stated it was their duty.14 For instance, the RTYC vice-president in Chandigarh was often the one to assist Tibetans going to the hospital or to help a Tibetan student out of police detention. Another example, Lhakpa Dolma and Lhakpa Bhuti, two women who were active members of TWA in Clement Town, Uttarakhand, saw the TWA as the only organisation doing something substantial in the settlement: ‘We are the social workers of the settlement.’15 The inhabitants in Clement Town did not need to present their problems to the CTA, instead, the women of TWA already knew everything that was going on in the settlement, and they would take the initiative to solve problems: ‘There is no need to let the government in Dharamsala solve our problems’, Lhakpa Dolma and Lhakpa Bhuti assured me. For these two women it was beneficial that the organisations which have local experience and knowledge relieved the overloaded government from some of their tasks. This has been even more helpful and important in scattered communities throughout India where the CTA was not represented. In these communities, Tibetan exile organisations assumed the role of welfare agencies, and thus functioned as the extended arm of the CTA. In this way, organisations have become partners to the government by taking care of the output legitimacy of democracy and providing services where necessary. Assisting democracy Numerous initiatives have also been taken to create platforms for democratic education and deliberation. Examples include ‘Patriotic Gatherings’ (rgyal zhen lhan ’dzoms) on Sundays in 2001 and 2002 in McLeod Ganj, which were public meetings arranged by young

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Tibetans who invited speakers to debate issues, such as unemployment or the role of religion in exile politics. In 2010, a group of friends and co-workers put together a play called ‘I want to be the kalon tripa [prime minister]’ to encourage youth to vote in the upcoming PM elections. Furthermore, three institutes have been established for the purpose of direct participation in the democratisation process: the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, the Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre and the Amnye Machen Institute. The Amnye Machen Institute (a myes rma chen bod kyi rig gzhung zhib ‘jug khang) was established in 1992 to study democracy and human rights. The institute published a bi-monthly newspaper Dmangs gtso (Democracy) which provided critical news and comments on the exile society and politics. It featured a column called ‘knowledge about democracy’ (dmangs gtso’i shes bya), dedicated to explaining models and aspects of democracy, such as ‘election’ (’os bsdu), ‘social democracy’ (spyi tshogs dmangs gtso), ‘conservatism’ (rnying zhen ring lugs), ‘secular state’ (’jig rten lugs kyi rgyal khab), ‘multi-party system’ (tshogs pa mang po’i lam lugs) and ‘liberal democracy’ (rang mos dmangs gtso). Amnye Machen Institute, however, discontinued the newspaper in 1996 and changed its focus to research and propagation of secular culture due to considerable pressure and stigmatisation from sections of the Tibetan exile population who accused the institute of being ‘anti-Dalai Lama’ because of its critical and investigative reports.16 The Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre (bod kyi gros tshogs dang srid byus nyams zhib khang) was established in 1991 in Delhi. It has portrayed itself as a non-governmental organisation, although it has been a centre under the CTA’s Department of Education and has worked closely with the parliament-in-exile. Its main sponsor, the German Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, has referred to the organisation as a think tank. It has also received funds from the National Endowment for Democracy. The Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre’s efforts have mainly been concentrated on creating political awareness by informing Tibetan exiles about the workings of the parliament-in-exile. It has publicised parliamentary

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proceedings in writing, on TV and CD, and has also lately financed the MPs’ visits to the settlements. Moreover, it has worked at strengthening the political image of the parliament-in-exile, arranged conferences, as well as informed about the CTA’s stances on autonomy, the Middle Way and non-violence. It has also lobbied the government of India, as well as created and retained relations with parliamentarian groups around the world. The third institute which has engaged in direct participation in the democratisation process is the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (bod kyi ’gro ba mi’i thob thang dang mang gtso ’phel rgyas lte gnas khang, hereafter TCHRD), founded in 1996. Previously it was a desk under the CTA’s Department of Information and International Relations, but it became registered under the Society Act and has worked as a research centre, producing reports and introductory material in Tibetan and English on different aspects related to democracy and human rights. Its main purpose has been to monitor, document and analyse the human rights situation inside Tibet, and its secondary goal has been to make people understand and value democracy. This institution has been an important actor when it comes to arranging workshops on democracy for local leaders, college students and organisations. These groups have been targeted by the TCHRD so that they can hand over their accumulated knowledge on democracy to their communities. The TCHRD has not been the mouthpiece of Tibetan exiles in India, but rather has instructed exiles about democracy in accordance with CTA discourse. Among its prodemocracy activities, the TCHRD has published a booklet for Tibetan secondary schools on democracy in English and Tibetan, and has also published a report on the history and the state of democracy in Tibetan exile.17 Most of these organisations have been organised according to democratic principles. I will now turn to the three initiatives in the Tibetan exile community that I have selected for a more in-depth analysis due to their significant grassroots work on democracy. Contrary to the three above-mentioned institutions (the TCHRD, the Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre, and the Amnye Machen Institute) whose main purpose was to collect and

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disseminate knowledge about democracy, the TYC, TWA and the YFBD have been organisations that have provided hands-on practice with democracy. Moreover, they have received and perpetuated the enchanted gift of democracy in different ways: Tibetan Youth Congress (hereafter TYC) has chosen to engage in acts of ‘disobedience’ while at the same time referring to support from the Dalai Lama; the Tibetan Women’s Association (hereafter TWA) has worked in line with the policies of the Dalai Lama and the CTA; and Youth for Better Democracy (hereafter YFBD) has chosen to voice their demands for change anonymously. Throughout the following, I discuss in more detail how these organisations have treated the gift of democracy, and how they have built upon dissimilar translations of democracy.

Tibetan Youth Congress The Tibetan Youth Congress is the largest Tibetan exile organisation in India and worldwide.18 Since its foundation in 1970, it has evolved into a 30,000-member organisation with 87 regional branches in India and abroad. The TYC has ‘four missions’: it follows the guidelines of the Dalai Lama as the spiritual and temporal leader of Tibet; promotes national unity and integrity regardless of religion, region or status; aspires to uphold Tibetan culture, tradition and religion; and, finally, the TYC struggles for an independent Tibet ‘even at the cost of one’s life’.19 The TYC subscribes to no ideology except that it struggles for ‘complete independence’ and not ‘autonomy’ as advocated by the Dalai Lama and the CTA. Some Tibetan critics have pointed out what they deem the contradiction of not supporting the official policy while still recognising the Dalai Lama as its leader. The TYC has understood itself as the only legitimate national platform representing all Tibetans. Tsering Tenchoe, one of the organisation’s leaders in 2005, expressed it like this during our conversation: ‘TYC is the highest platform a Tibetan who wants to struggle for freedom can work at. It’s not just an NGO, it’s a freedom struggle movement.’20 The TYC has also claimed to have a large

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following inside Tibet, enjoying mass support amongst Tibetans at home and abroad. The TYC’s central leadership has asserted how people have faith in their organisation, and one of its leaders rhetorically asked me during an interview in 2005: ‘Who will lead people after the Dalai Lama is gone?’ Another TYC leader, Kesang Norbu, believed that the TYC was fit to take the lead in critical times to continue the freedom struggle.21 The name Tibetan Youth Congress (bod kyi gzhon nu lhan tshogs) suggests that it represents Tibetan youth only, but there has been no upper age limit for membership. Tibetans can be members and participate in its activities as long as they want, and many adults do. A common misunderstanding has been that all young Tibetan exiles, especially college students, are members of the TYC. They have often been stereotyped as active TYC members fighting for independence, and often this has been contrasted with the older generation and in opposition to the CTA. Even the Dalai Lama and CTA representatives have reproduced this misconception in their previous statements. Moreover, Tibetans have commonly used the shorthand ‘youth’ (gzhon nu) to refer to the TYC. This has sometimes caused misunderstandings, also during my interviews. When I asked questions about young Tibetans using the words ‘Tibetan youth’, many interviewees believed that I specifically meant the TYC. The TYC has recruited many members among students in schools (the minimum age is 14) who have usually been politically unaware. Consequently, as the former local TYC leader Diki Choyang asserted, many young members were ‘not joining through true political motive’.22 Though passionate about the freedom struggle, their political insights have generally been poor. They have typically joined because their friends or teachers told them to, and some even believed TYC membership was mandatory in school. The second surge of recruitment usually happens at college – at this time membership has usually been based on a more conscious decision. When young Tibetans have had to move out of the safety of the Tibetan settlements and into an Indian city where there is usually no Tibetan community, it has often been the TYC that has picked up these college youth and incorporated them into an exceedingly

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politicised community. These highly educated youth have typically undergone a political awakening when they attended Indian colleges, and it has often been from this group that the TYC has recruited its leaders. The central leadership of the TYC has been formed by ten executive members democratically elected for three years at the general body meeting, the highest policy-making body. Known as Centrex, they have worked full time in positions of president, vicepresident, public relations officer, editor, accountant etc., from the headquarters in Dharamsala. Throughout multiple talks I had with the twelfth Centrex, I gained the impression that the Centrex members were very conscious about how they represented their cause and themselves, using key terms from civil society and liberal democracy discourses. They appeared to be products of the very same workshops that they offered to Tibetans, including courses on management, leadership, empowerment and democracy. They had in this way acquired the careful etiquette of skilled politicians. The TYC has a formalised bureaucracy, deemed by some other young Tibetans as too rigid – almost like a mini-model of the CTA. They may have started as young activists, but in many cases, members have turned into bureaucrats and politicians, as some Tibetans have complained and pointed towards how the TYC has been a training ground for CTA staff and numerous political leaders, like the former PM Samdhong Rinpoche and the present PM Lobsang Sangay. While the TYC often has prided itself that many of the current Tibetan leaders have had their political education in the TYC, several Centrex members nevertheless saw government work as less honourable than TYC activism. As the TYC leader Tashi Puntsok commented in 2005: ‘I don’t want to be a politician. I want to be an activist. TYC isn’t a job, but serving the people.’23 The wish to be activists rather than politicians partly stems from their observations that former leaders of the TYC have changed when they obtained a career within the CTA as a parliamentarian, civil servant or even as the PM. When they entered the government buildings many became mute or forgot their radical stances, Pema Thinley, the editor of the Tibetan Review, told me.24 Another reason why Centrex

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members have disclaimed any desire to pursue government careers is due to the manner in which the TYC has perceived itself as an alternative voice to the CTA. One TYC leader, Kesang Norbu, explained it like this: ‘If I join the CTA, then automatically I have to speak for autonomy rather than independence, and it’s very hard for me to do that.’25 Centrex has planned and coordinated activities for the regional branches (hereafter RTYC) as well as performed tasks directed towards the international community to generate support for the Tibetan cause having organised, informed, networked and lobbied the international community. For example, the TYC has taken on the responsibility of replying to the official statements produced by the State Council of the PRC in the form of white papers,26 a task that was previously taken care of by the CTA, and it has also responded to Tibetan exile politics by assessing, commenting on and suggesting changes to present structures, procedures and policies. The regional branches, or RTYCs, have done more practical work and worked with orders given by the TYC central in Dharamsala. RTYCs around India have been strong and efficiently organised in the settlements, and they might in fact be the only organisational body present throughout these scattered communities. Therefore, they have performed many of the tasks that the CTA would ordinarily be expected to perform, such as: educational work, cultural work, social welfare activities and political work including informing and mobilising people for demonstrations. In the Indian city of Chandigarh where there is a large community of Tibetan students enrolled at Panjab University, there have been no government representatives. The RTYC has been the only organisational body present there and, consequently, the president of the RTYC has taken care of the entire exile-Tibetan college community. Sangye Tarchin, who was once the RTYC Chandigarh president, told me about the many roles that the RTYC has played in uniting the Tibetan community in Chandigarh. It has brought messages from the CTA, engaged in social work, as well as provided moral and social policing. Additionally, the RTYCs have carried out instructions from Centrex, upheld the annual calendar of

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demonstrations and performed ad-hoc activities as instructed from Dharamsala headquarters.27 In regards to democracy-building, the very existence of the TYC can be seen as contributing to a more democratic community. Not only is it a democratic organisation, but it is also regarded as an alternative voice and platform in relation to the CTA. In its early years, it was seen as a radical and ‘quasi-militant’ organisation whose ‘parent figure’ is the CTA itself.28 Later, the TYC gained the reputation of being ‘a training ground for exile administration service’,29 a ‘political thorn in the government’s side’,30 ‘rebels’,31 and a contender for national loyalty among the exiles and thus a competing force to the CTA.32 The TYC has often seen itself as playing an active and progressive role in democracy-building, as constituting a pressure group in relation to the CTA, and as being an agent for change. It has introduced itself as an organisation that emerged from the minds of young Tibetans who were the first batch of graduating Tibetan exiles to have received a ‘balanced modern and traditional education’.33 The TYC has had a reformist political culture and has been ‘ahead of its time’ by passing resolutions suggesting such changes as two houses in parliament, a multi-party system and direct elections of prime ministers. Overall, the TYC has not perceived the democratic system as a finished end-product, but as a system underway towards ‘true democracy’. Within the democratisation process, the TYC has seen itself as playing an indispensable role. Nevertheless, it has continued to acknowledge how democracy is a great achievement considering the difficult circumstances of exile, the short exposure that Tibetans have had to democracy and the fact that democracy was offered as a gift. Many TYC members have talked about ‘true democracy’ or ‘real democracy’ as something that was difficult to achieve in a society that never aspired for democracy but was given as a gift. Tashi Puntsok, an executive member of TYC in 2005 was of the opinion that the TYC pushed the Tibetan community towards pure democracy: When I’m saying we are in the process of development and the process of learning, I’m trying to point out that Tibetan

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democracy was established in the early 1960s, and it’s been only 40 odd years. So, it was very difficult to form a democratic society among people who do not want or who do not ask for democracy. It’s very difficult for them. You must be aware that there are so many countries in the world who fought to, to – blood was shed to get democracy. But in our case it was quite contrary. His Holiness was trying to give us democracy, whereas a certain section of people in our community, they were quite reluctant to get it, to take it. But, more or less, ultimately, democracy was established in our community [. . .] In our case, it was quite difficult to impose democracy in our Tibetan society [. . .] [but] we are in the process of becoming a more pure democratic society.34 The TYC has been committed to strengthening the input legitimacy of democracy, i.e. its procedural aspects, especially since 1988, and more particularly to channel its efforts in educating Tibetan exiles and promoting participation and representativity. The TYC has suggested that procedures and structures should be more participation-friendly and has encouraged people to exercise their democratic duties and not only their rights. It has resolved to strengthen and develop democracy through three general foci: increase education by organising workshops; increase participation by proposing a ‘mandatory voter turnout’ (’os ’phen gyi las rim nang zhugs yod med cha rkyen) for civil servants; and increase representativity and accountability by creating a ‘system of an upper and lower house of the parliament’ (gros tshogs gong ’og gi lam lugs).35 Under the present system, the TYC has argued, the electorate has been alienated from its representatives. It therefore has envisioned a bicameral system of legislation, i.e. two distinct parliamentary chambers with an upper house keeping the religion – region template and a lower house with members based on exile constituency. In addition to the system of two houses, the TYC has envisioned a multi-party system as an important element of a ‘real democracy’. Both ideas have also been suggested by the Dalai Lama and thereby have been legitimised.36 The overall idea has been that party-based and

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constituency-based representatives in the legislative body will ensure that decisions are taken by representatives who are answerable to their constituency, and who are speaking the opinions of the people. Towards this ideal, the TYC has also launched a political party: the National Democratic Party of Tibet (bod kyi rgyal yongs mang gtso tshogs pa).

National Democratic Party of Tibet Although Tibetans have developed a no-party system, there have been a few attempts to form political parties. There was, for instance, a short-lived Communist Party.37 The National Democratic Party of Tibet (hereafter NDPT) has, since its formation in 1994, been the sole player on a political stage otherwise empty of political parties. It has about 5,000 members today. The NDPT traces its origin to a speech given by the Dalai Lama in 1990 in which he encouraged the TYC to establish a political party.38 The eighth general assembly passed a resolution in 1992 to form a ‘national political party’ (rgyal yongs srid don gyi tshogs pa), but it was nevertheless not recognised as such by the parliament-in-exile.39 Karma Choephel, the first president of the NDPT and, at the time of our talk in 2007, the chairman of the parliament, explained: When we started the National Democratic Party of Tibet in 1994, of course before that, for a number of years, His Holiness had been advising the Central Executive of the Tibetan Youth Congress to start a political party. The TYC was the most democratic organisation in the Tibetan diaspora, so he advised that: ‘You should start a political party, and then we can hope that some other group challenge that and start a political party. At least if we have two political parties then the exercise in democracy would be better. People would be able to engage themselves individually in the political exercise.’ So that was his hope [. . .] They requested me to take over as the founding president. I did that not because – as I told you, I am not a politician – not for any political ambition, but for proper

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democracy. For the proper understanding of democracy, for the proper firm institutionalisation of democracy, I believe political parties should be there. Towards that I thought I would be able to contribute a little to Tibetan democracy. That is why I took interest. Now, of course in that sense of having political parties and fighting in elections along political lines, it has not been realised so far. But then, whenever there is a general election, you look at how things are functioning: the organisations which take the name of the three provinces and the religious groups, they are functioning as well as political parties.40 The first interesting observation here is that Karma Choephel explained how the party was established out of the need to culturalise the people into a democratic ethos (to practise democracy). However, to Karma Choephel’s disappointment, the Tibetan parliament-inexile did not recognise the NDPT as a political party. Nonetheless, he interposed, the parliament matrix had indeed recognised the interests of special identities that replaced political parties: the parliament was constituted by ten seats reserved for two representatives from each of the five religious traditions, 30 seats for ten delegates from each of the three Tibetan provinces and finally, seats for exile constituencies. Although the NDPT was not endorsed in parliament and in the election rules, they started campaigning before the 1995 elections for the twelfth parliament-in-exile. Former TYC leader 37-year-old Karma Yeshi was one of the MPs whom the NDPT has campaigned for. He was of the opinion that because the three regional groups were afraid that their own candidates would not get elected, they argued against a party system, saying rhetorically during an interview: ‘Oh, why do we need a party system? Our leader is His Holiness, everybody believes. To which party does he belong to?’ Like that. That can be their argument, like that. So that is how the National [Democratic] Party didn’t get parliamentarian recognition. Now slowly, slowly, I think it will get recognition.41

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As Karma Yeshi and Karma Choephel suggested, regional groups have been the closest equivalents to political parties, and by regional groups I particularly refer to the large home-district associations and especially their umbrella organisations which have been politically involved. They have sought influence and representation in the parliament-in-exile and campaigned for their own regional representatives before the national elections.42 Then president of the NDPT, Chemey Yungdrung, however, objected to this. He thought that Tibetan exile organisations were unable to be a ‘direct and perfect bridge between the government and people’ as he had observed in ‘advanced countries: countries with more democracy’. In his opinion, it was only political parties that could carry such responsibility.43 The NDPT has prided itself in possessing the ‘five features characterizing a political party’: a ‘party constitution’ (tshogs pa’i rtsa khrims), a ‘political manifesto’ (tshogs pa’i srid byus sgrags gtam), a ‘party flag’ (tshogs pa’i dar cha), ‘party symbols’ (tshogs pa’i ngo bo mtshon ched kyi las rtags), and a ‘definite party ideology’ (tshogs pa’i lta ba nges can).44 The NDPT, nonetheless, has had a difficult time convincing people that it was a political party at all. It has not represented any special political interest or ideology, except for fighting for complete independence with non-violent means and safeguarding and promoting a democracy which ‘has been gifted by His Holiness the Dalai Lama’.45 The religion–region template of the parliament has meant that the NDPT has not been able to compete for seats. Nevertheless, it has published lists of regional candidates to the parliament and has campaigned for them, though they have not necessarily been members of the party. Out of the 32 names on the list of nominees suggested by the NDPT for the fourteenth parliament, 19 NDPT candidates have ended up in parliament (of which seven were new MPs).46 Among the nominees, 13 people have also appeared on the preliminary list publicised by YBMPs. Only eight of the names endorsed by NDPT for the fifteenth parliament have not appeared on the YFBD list, and 12 of the 21 candidates have been elected. It could be argued that the NDPT has played no important role as a non-governmental undertaking, and it has not been near enough to

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the grassroots activities like its mother, the TYC. As a political party it has played an insignificant role, according to several informants. Nonetheless, since the TYC has wanted to be in the forefront of making Tibetan society more democratic, establishing a political party has been an obvious step towards ‘real democracy’.

Tibetan Women’s Organisation The next organisation examined more closely in this chapter, the Tibetan Women’s Organisation (TWA, bod kyi bud med lhan tshogs), traces its origin to the uprising in Lhasa on 12 March 1959.47 It has seen a revival in India in 1984 as the result of an address by the Dalai Lama in which he stated that it was imperative to organise women. Generally, TWA has referred to these statements by the Dalai Lama for legitimising its existence, and it has supported his Middle-Way approach as well as enjoyed good relations with the CTA. Tenzin Dhardon Sharling, a 24-year-old staff member at the headquarters and later elected to the Tibetan parliament-in-exile in 2011, commented in 2005 on a general TWA attitude that it is important that NGOs and the CTA support each other: I think a good and efficient NGO must always go in sync, you know, run in parallel with the Tibetan government. Moreover, regarding us, we have never had a fallout, not a single problem with the Tibetan government. Whatever the Tibetan government proposes, we examine it and we are always sure that the Tibetan government is the strongest body, and they will always come with something good. Moreover, they represent the Dalai Lama, so naturally whatever they do we always support them.48 The TWA has planned and carried out regular political information campaigns, demonstrations and commemorations, as well as religious activities, such as conducting prayers for the Dalai Lama on auspicious days. It has been dedicated to political, social and economic empowerment of women through, inter alia, education

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(e.g. workshops in health, rights, leadership), economic support (e.g. finding sponsors) and training skills (e.g. tailoring and leadership). The TWA’s bureaucracy is similar to the TYC’s structure, with a central leadership working full time at the headquarters in Dharamsala. The TWA has trained women towards leadership positions, and several former TWA office holders have become members of parliament and even ministers in the cabinet. TWA leadership has often been a mix of older and younger women from different socio-economic backgrounds and educational levels. The 11-strong central executive committee forming the leadership is elected for three-year terms. Women nominated for the central leadership have usually neither asked for their consensus nor has their presence at the meeting been required. Moreover, nominated candidates have often refused nomination. This was confirmed by Butler who noted that to be labelled as a person actively seeking office is a taboo.49 People I have spoken to, who had received positions of power, whether it was the neighbourhood RTWA representative or the 2001 –11 prime minister Samdhong Rinpoche, assured me that they were not interested in the post, but that they felt obliged to accept the responsibility that a majority vote had given them. Some even felt that the positions had been forced upon them. We see here the workings of a strong norm of anticompetitiveness, which will also be related in Chapter 5. Competitions for TWA posts at the local and central levels are becoming more typical, although women generally have not campaigned for themselves but for others.50 The few who actively sought offices were careful to make public disclaimers saying they had been encouraged to stand for election and expressed embarrassment over this. The TWA has tried to strengthen input legitimacy of democracy by improving voter turnout among exile-Tibetan women through awareness campaigns, but it has not campaigned for specific candidates like the regional organisations or the NDPT have done. The TWA has made no attempt to change the current democratic set-up of the CTA, but instead has worked within and in support of the current structures. Moreover, elections have often been seen as

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the major feature of democracy, and voting has become a ritual within the organisation. Two RTWA social workers in Clement Town, Lhakpa Dolma and Lhakpa Bhuti, explained during our conversation in 2006 how their work was sometimes hindered by democracy, especially because they always had to let the people vote on their initiatives. They experienced negative effects of democracy when the majority voted against changes proposed, the two ladies explained. They agreed, however, that since democracy was a gift from the Dalai Lama, it was overall something good.51 The TWA has contributed to democratisation, although it has not been deeply immersed in the political scene in Dharamsala. It has been at the local level that the TWA in particular has asserted itself by providing members with democratic experience and leadership training. Local organisation and democratic experiences The settlements have provided the TWA with their main recruitment ground. Few people have been recruited from schools and colleges since the TWA has not had branch offices there. Take, for example, the case of 37-year-old civil servant and RTWA president in Bylakuppe, Pema Sangmo. When she was at college in 1991, her parents got her a membership card and admitted her into the RTWA back in the settlement. She accepted her membership in the organisation because she felt the obligation to fulfil her parents’ wish. Pema Sangmo did not know much about the TWA, however, but learned more about the organisation upon becoming an executive member. Members in her chapter are, in her words, ‘ready to serve. Whatever we say, they do. They have full faith in us.’52 A common perception has prevailed among exile-Tibetan women that local TWA members are less educated but ‘very patriotic’. Great differences have been observed by Butler between the central leadership at the Dharamsala headquarters and local members in the settlements.53 At the local level, members have tended to be older than the general female population. There has therefore been a higher proportion of illiterate and non-Englishspeaking members who were ‘more traditional and conservative in their attitudes’.54 Twenty-three-year-old Chemi Dolma, whom I met

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in 2006, had studied outside her settlement, and upon her return to Bylakuppe, she was given a position in the local RTWA. She was taken aback by the shortcomings of the other executive members: ‘Those elected don’t know how to run it.’55 They did not understand the nature of work because they were not educated enough. Yet, she saw how committed they were: ‘They are very patriotic’ but it was ‘hard to work without knowledge . . . I was the only person with an education and they trusted me a lot.’ Her statement mirrored that of several young and highly educated women who had quickly advanced to leadership positions in the TWA. According to Chemi Dolma, RTWA would just do its duty to struggle for freedom, and it did the same things perennially. Now, however, they fight for women’s rights, do community service and educate themselves and other women within the community. The local bureaucracy of each RTWA is a miniature model of the headquarters in Dharamsala with a board of executive members. Apart from these leadership positions, they have neighbourhood representatives and a system that has functioned efficiently when messages from the headquarters need to be conveyed to individual members. This system has been independent of other local communication lines described in the previous chapter. RTWA Bylakuppe provides a relevant illustration. It has one neighbourhood representative (ru dpon) in every village and two in every camp which have acted as the link between the president of the RTWA and the women in the villages and camps.56 In the following, I describe the position of the neighbourhood representative and map the social and political work of the TWA in the settlements. The position of the neighbourhood representative within the RTWA bureaucracy has not necessarily been a democratic post, but some neighbourhoods have preferred to elect their representative through democratic vote among members. A number of neighbourhoods have found their representative on a rotational basis, while others have simply picked whoever was the first to volunteer or have kept the same woman in the post for years on end. The neighbourhood representative typically oversees all activities at the local level, carries messages from the TWA to the doorstep of every

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member of her village, attends meetings, keeps track of finances and generates income by collecting donations, distributing raffle-books, and organising members to prepare and sell food or serve tea at community gatherings. The representative is also typically responsible for distributing work in the neighbourhood ordered by the RTWA, such as cleaning the village before visits by the Dalai Lama or providing security during his teachings in the settlement. She also provides ‘volunteers’ for rallies when the RTWA asks for a fixed number of participants from each neighbourhood. Furthermore, the neighbourhood representative organises local welfare work for those in need under her jurisdiction; members are sent to the homes of the elderly to aid them with their laundry, food, hospital bills and funeral rituals. She will also keep track of the ritual calendar when special prayers are to be conducted and arranges long-life prayers for the Dalai Lama. Moreover, the representative mediates in disputes and ‘settles things’ for women although strictly speaking this falls beyond her realm of responsibilities but comes under the jurisdiction of the camp leader. Those women serving as neighbourhood representatives understand their position very differently: one woman feels she is a servant, but another feels like a leader in her community. Whether the neighbourhood representative feels like a servant or a leader depends not only on how she personally experiences her position, but also on her ability to manifest and execute authority over other women. For Lhamo Yangchen, a 72-year-old neighbourhood representative in Bylakuppe, being a neighbourhood representative is a position of respect and power. She can command people to do things – and she has done so unflinchingly. Lhamo Yangchen laughed about this when I commented: ‘You are the queen of Camp 1.’ She retorted: ‘I am Indira Gandhi of Camp 1.’57 In contrast to Tsering Yangzom, Deden Nyima, a 23-year-old neighbourhood representative of Village 3 likened herself to a servant, because being a neighbourhood representative meant a lot of work and responsibility. However, since she was democratically elected, she could not refuse her duty. Deden Nyima was resigned to the fact that she may well have to do a second term: ‘It’s in the people’s hands, you know, if they want me again,

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then I have to do it. When the time has come to vote, it’s in people’s hands.’58 Since the RTWA is present in camps and villages, inhabitants are given opportunities to personally experience democracy by electing members to the boards and representatives to voice their special interests. Yet recruitment of new members has proven difficult, and those recruited often have little knowledge of the TWA. Though the RTWAs have rules and regulations parallel to those of the headquarters in Dharamsala, nevertheless it is not uncommon that local democratic posts are inherited. For example, the young public relations officer of RTWA Bylakuppe, 23-year-old Chemi Dolma, inherited her position from her mother who left the settlement when she had another six months of her term as an executive member. Chemi Dolma stepped in, and since she felt that she learned a lot from her time as an executive member, she decided to stay for another three-year term – this time democratically elected to the post.59 The second case is 23-year-old Deden Nyima, also in Bylakuppe, who inherited her mother’s position as the village’s TWA representative (ru dpon). The RTWA members in her village knew that Deden Nyima had a lot of time on her hands, and they thought it might be good for her to work as a neighbourhood representative. Since Deden Nyima was not a member of RTWA, they democratically elected her mother who was a member, but she was uneducated so the duty was passed on to her daughter. Deden Nyima acted as the neighbourhood representative on behalf of her mother and thereby gained experience and interest that she might otherwise never have had. Like so many other cases of young women and men appointed to such posts, Deden Nyima knew little about the organisation before she was thrown into a leadership position and given responsibility. She was grateful for all her experiences as neighbourhood representative, and considered her ‘forced’ participation in rallies as increasing her engagement in the freedom struggle. Thus, not only did her village believe that they benefitted from her work, but Deden Nyima felt that she has benefitted considerably from inheriting the post.60 Inheriting posts that, according to regulations, should be filled through democratic election is common practice in the villages.

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On the one hand, such practices question the public’s understanding of democracy, but on the other hand, it is also a sign of how traditional practices have survived in exile, and how difficult it can be to fill leadership positions. Lhamo Yangchen in Camp 1 explained how each family sent one woman to the inception of RTWA Bylakuppe – a total of 105 women were present at the first meeting. The organisation had shrunk to 77 members because of the dwindling figures of young members who were busy with studies or away on business.61 Recruitment of members in the settlements commonly happens when an older member retires or passes away, and her responsibilities are given to a daughter. Yet, as in the cases of Chemi Dolma and Deden Nyima, the practice of inheriting membership and leadership positions has also had positive effects. They receive hands-on experience with organisation and community work. Thus, by circumventing the norms of democracy, young exile Tibetans who remain in the settlements can take an active part in organisational life. These women, who had not been democratically elected, nonetheless utilised their positions to practise democracy. Moreover, in many cases this procedure has been the only way to recruit new local leaders. Democracy is also cultural capital, in that an extra benefit has been that through accumulating leadership experience in the settlement, ambitions for reaching higher goals might be invoked, perhaps even leading all the way to the exiles’ political capital of Dharamsala.

Youth for Better Democracy Youth for Better MPs (YBMPs) and Youth for Better Democracy (YFBD) were the names of the groups behind anonymous campaigns on the internet and wall posters to secure selected candidates before the 2006 and 2011 elections for the parliament-in-exile and the 2011 prime minister election.62 The initiative to start a campaign was not, unlike many other democracy initiatives, funded by an international democracy promoter.63 The idea of the YFBD originated among a few youth in Dharamsala who formed a network with other Tibetan exiles through mobile phones, chat rooms and

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email. Among its principal organisers was the poet and Friends of Tibet activist Tenzin Tsundue, who was voted by the Englishlanguage youth magazine Tibetan World as the second most influential Tibetan after then prime-minister-in-exile Samdhong Rinpoche.64 Two other core members were Norzin Wangmo and Pema Gyal, who for years had been engaged in the TYC and Students for a Free Tibet.65 Ahead of the 2011 election, they were joined by another interlocutor, Norbu Tashi, who in 2010 had led the initiative for the theatre play ‘I want to be the kalon tripa [prime minister]’ that performed in Dharamsala, Bir, Chandigarh and Delhi. He made two documentaries on this play and even had t-shirts made in order to create awareness and to provoke Tibetans to announce their candidacy. He then joined the YFBD and also became SFT’s allIndia director.66 These youth, all below 30 years of age, used their collection of email addresses and phone numbers to reach out to other young Tibetans in India. They have had no rigid bureaucracy like that of the TYC and TWA, neither membership cards nor rules. People have been free to enter and leave this network without obligations. They have discussed issues online in magazines and blogs, used mobile phones to message their friends for action or email to reach the whole network instantly. These features of flexibility and informality have appealed to young Tibetans, but it was still restricted by the exileTibetan political culture. According to Pema Gyal, the YBMPs chose to be anonymous because people would otherwise incorrectly believe that they campaigned on behalf of the other organisations they were active in. Moreover, they felt the need to maintain a low profile to ward off opposition or strong reactions from the community: We have to be careful about how politics works here. Otherwise, if you write your name [on the posters] then they will say it’s not me but the organisation that is doing all these things, because our community has not reached that level of understanding . . . We have to be careful about misconceptions. Miscommunication is quite big, especially when doing this kind of way, you know.67

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Furthermore, 29-year-old Norbu Tashi pointed to the problem of misconception and mentioned to me in 2012 that the group’s Tibetan name signalled that they were young volunteers whose motivation for action was not for political rivalry or personal gain, but for democracy. They had taken it upon themselves to work for democracy.68 The network had produced a list of candidates and made posters in Tibetan and English in 2005 for the preliminary elections which were plastered on walls around town before the electorate nominated candidates. I personally saw these posters in McLeod Ganj and Gangchen Kyishong, and supposedly posters were sent elsewhere, but nobody I spoke with in Dehradun, Delhi or Bylakuppe could recollect the campaign. The list promoted on these posters contained ten names from each province, out of which six already held seats in the thirteenth parliament.69 The rest of the nominees had held posts in organisations (TYC, TWA, Utsang Organisation), and there were also a couple of teachers, directors, editors, researchers and a journalist. Among the 12 who were finally elected, six were new faces in the parliament. A closer look at the list also reveals that 13 of the YFBD candidates were also suggested by the NDPT. Interestingly, only ten of the 30 names were endorsed five years later when the YFBD again produced English- and Tibetan- language posters. This time, 13 of the candidates were among the 21 that were also promoted by the NDPT. Seventeen YFBD candidates got elected. The candidates endorsed in 2006 and 2011 elections were presented in the template of the three regions. Norbu Tashi explained to me that they did not feel qualified to come up with candidates for the religious seats, and they were under no illusion that they could influence the elections to the religious seats anyway, since it was really up to the monasteries to decide who would represent them in the parliament.70 Therefore, they endorsed regional candidates only. The purpose of the campaign was not only to get the appropriate MPs to the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, but also to encourage youth to vote and prevent them from voting blindly. Norbu Tashi explained how difficult it had been to come up with ten names from each region when you do not even know who is from which region. For instance, one of the influential founders of the YFBD, Tenzin Tsundue, has

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received many Kham nominations while he is actually of Utsang origin – or maybe it is the other way around? Norbu Tashi giggled as he related this to me, mentioning: ‘I am from Bir. So, our identity is more connected with the region in India. [. . .] There is no culture of asking your friend, like you know, “are you from Kham, Amdo, Utsang?”’ No, he concluded, the Tibetans really need some guidance and encouragement ahead of elections. Who are good MPs? Pema Gyal explained that the campaign was born out of the realisation that if you want to change something, then you have to do it on the level of the government, since ‘we know the power of the legislation’. The YFBD realised that they had to ensure that the representatives of the people were qualified: ‘We needed people who are liberal, MPs who could think of the people and the future of Tibet, you know, who have more vision.’ Pema Gyal thought that too many MPs had been ‘narrow minded’, and he was concerned about how this tarnished the democratisation process: There are so many different ways of looking at issues. Some of them [in the parliament] have a very narrow idea, and that’s why sometimes it creates separatism within the Tibetan cause, you know. There’s a lot of internal politics. A representative who is not good, he tries to bring in petty politics. We don’t want that to happen. We don’t want this legislation to turn into a mockery of democracy.71 The YFBD endorsed educated candidates for the Tibetan parliament-in-exile whom they believed were able to reflect upon issues instead of letting religious convictions or regional loyalties influence their decision. Moreover, the YFBD did not want representatives who left all responsibility up to the Dalai Lama. As Pema Gyal related: We don’t want MPs who just follow the winds and times of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Even if a member of parliament is

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adopting the Middle-Way approach, we need that to be reasonable: he needs to explain it reasonably. Right now the problem is that most of them say ‘we are following the Middle Way because of His Holiness.’ They don’t look for reasons. They don’t look for other aspects. So in that way it could also be someone who follows the Middle Way, but has good arguments? Yeah. Basically, our idea was people who could really serve the interest of the people, and these people, [MP] Karma Yeshi and all, they have come to this point through grassroots activities, and they know the people. There are representatives who have done nothing their whole life! Just because their father was some kind of a leader of a particular region . . . that’s why she gets elected. In one of the representatives’ biography there was only one criteria: She said that ‘I have served my father well’ and she went to school till class ten. So these are the qualifications of the members of parliament. But still these people make laws. Now, just imagine if these people make laws, what will be the result of the law?72 According to youth supporting the YFBD, parliamentarians should be able to work for national interests. Amongst Tibetans in India, communalism along the lines of regional and religious affiliations is an issue of great concern, and it has been publicly addressed by one of the YFBD organisers, Tenzin Tsundue, on several occasions.73 The YFBD believed that education would erase regionalism; therefore, when they selected names for their list, they focused on young and educated people whose concern was not limited to their cohort from their home district. Yet, although they were critical of regionalism, members of the YFBD organised their list of nominees within the region-template of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile. Pema Gyal believed that, although not all people on their list were elected in the end, their campaign was successful because it created awareness among people. Most importantly, it was an alternative campaign opposed to the campaigns led by regional organisations, which the

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YFBD did not want to become too powerful because this could create rifts between people. By making their own list, these youth wanted to facilitate the selection process because many Tibetans did not know whom to nominate. In comparison to the modest campaign in 2005 and 2006 with photocopied posters pasted up on walls around Dharamsala, five years later the YFBD launched several campaigns in which they made colourful posters, a website, and arranged political debates with both the PM and MP candidates. Furthermore, well in advance of the election, they made voting registration awareness campaigns, such as having two boys dress up as human-sized ‘green books’ dancing around the streets of McLeod Ganj reminding people to bring their green books and become registered to vote. At this point, the YFBD was more about creating awareness than getting particular people into the parliament. In conclusion, the initiative by these youths who first called themselves Youth for Better MPs and then Youth for Better Democracy sought to strengthen the input legitimacy of democracy by facilitating voter participation and ensuring that qualified candidates become elected as MPs. For people organised in the YFBD, it was important that the MPs who represented the Tibetans and made decisions on their behalf were qualified, i.e. educated, and it was important that the electorate was able to make informed decisions about who were to represent them. This was the work that these young volunteers engaged in for promoting democracy, who also realised that this would be a continuous task in an aspiring young democracy. Pema Gyal, in our conversation in 2007, was acutely aware of the importance that their initiatives had in that someone had to take the lead and initiate what could potentially be a mass movement: ‘Every movement starts from the few people . . . We don’t need many people but a few dedicated people who make a conscious effort, and then other people follow it.’74

Partners in democracy-building Although one may question whether Tibetan exile organisations qualify as civil society actors, it is obvious that Tibetans in India have

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had a rich organisational life which has formed a considerable force in the democratisation process together with the CTA. The three organisations that I have presented in this chapter have received and perpetuated the gift of democracy by positively influencing and participating in the democratisation process: the TYC by being a critical voice working for democratic changes; the TWA by empowering women for participation in the CTA and supporting it; and the YFBD by raising awareness and trying to change the membership of the existing parliament-in-exile. These different foci of the democratisation process have also been the result of how the three organisations have translated and assessed democracy differently. Their initiatives have been directed towards strengthening democracy’s input legitimacy by increasing voter-turnout rates or influencing elections, but commonly they have also relieved the CTA of its duties to support output aspects of democracy by providing social services. These organisations have obviously been very aware of their roles as primary educators in democracy, along with the important roles that they perform. A few interlocutors, nonetheless, doubted that the organisations in Dharamsala would qualify as civil society actors who are clearly distinguishable from and independent of the CTA (replacing the state) in accordance with the ideal of a definite separation between the state and civil society. This doubt has been mostly raised regarding to the close connection that these organisations have had with the CTA, and how they have been expected to support the freedom struggle and the Tibetan nation under the leadership of the Dalai Lama. Another restricting factor has been the role of sponsors. In the remainder of this chapter I explore the concern that these partners in democracy-building have compromised the organisations’ independence and room to manoeuvre. Several organisations, for example the mutual-aid societies, the NDPT and the TWA, owe their origin to the wishes of the Dalai Lama. Together with the CTA and the Dalai Lama, they have formed a collective of exile-Tibetan leadership, and they have had a long history of cooperation. In fact, the TYC used to see itself as complementing the CTA. Government staff was recruited from the

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TYC based on recommendations from Centrex, and according to one informant, some TYC executive members also came from the CTA on deputation in the 1970s and 1980s. The close bond between the TYC and the CTA was allegedly cut off after Samdhong Rinpoche became prime minister in 2001. Nowadays, civil servants are forbidden NGO membership and attendance at NGO functions, and organisations do not enjoy special privileges from the CTA. In this way, Samdhong Rinpoche aimed to develop democracy in accordance with the generally accepted idea that civil society actors should be separate from and independent of the state (here the CTA). Some organisations have argued that they are in fact better platforms than the CTA because they are less restricted and can work independently serving the Tibetan cause. Being independent means that the CTA cannot dictate agendas, but the CTA most likely will nonetheless appeal to the organisations. During my fieldwork, when the Dalai Lama sent delegations to negotiate in Beijing and when the Chinese president visited India, the cabinet appealed to the organisations not to raise anti-Chinese slogans, in order to appease China. TYC was famous for its disobedience towards the CTA when it protested against China.75 One of its leaders at the time, Tashi Phuntsok, commented: Whenever the Chinese premier or Chinese president visits India, we get an appeal letter from the government, appealing not to organise any kind of activities during the visit. But who are we to listen to them?!76 Other activists in Dharamsala also talked about the censorious pressure from the CTA, while simultaneously assuring that they were independent of the establishment. Although interlocutors generally recognised that organisations should be independent of the CTA, they nevertheless stressed that they should help each other as well. In fact, we can see these organisations and the CTA as partners in democracy-building. Even when they claimed to be oppositional, as was often the case with the TYC, they still reproduced the dominant discourse and values promoted by the CTA. The various initiatives

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seem to expect from each other that they work smoothly together, as transmission belts, but at the same time they desired plurality, similar to the entrenchment model. Furthermore, that there was often a porous border between the normative domain and the civil society domain does not necessarily constitute a problem. If we compare with state –civil society relationships elsewhere in Asia, we see that civil society takes many forms ranging from, in the words of Alagappa: co-optation and manipulation of civil society by the state, deep penetration and influence over the state by certain civil society actors, productive tension between the two in a context of overall agreement on the political and economic framework, contestation over certain fundamental issues, alienation and isolation of civil society organisations from the state, or outright rejection of the state by key segments of civil society.77 The state, in this way, has been a major force for both restricting and facilitating the development of civil society in various countries throughout Asia. In most cases, Alagappa proposed, the state and civil society are mutually dependent.78 The relationship between state and civil society need not be confrontational; they can be interdependent in the democratisation process because they mutually influence each other. Held has likewise highlighted how the state and civil society have created the conditions for the democratic development of both institutions.79 According to Held, in reality, civil society can never fully be separated from the state, since it is the state that provides the overall legal framework of society. Held placed this fundamental relation of state and civil society at the core of his understanding of an ideal democratic platform. It follows that any democratisation has to be a process of ‘double democratisation’.80 That is to say, that state and civil society interdependently undergo democratic transformations. That the Tibetan civil society actors have been the partners of the CTA – serving here as a proxy state – does not mean that the organisations were not creating an autonomous sphere from which they could influence and even

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change the direction of democratisation and people’s participation. In fact, they were also able to carve out a space for themselves as agents of change, not only as transmission belts of dominant discourse emerging from the normative domain. Additionally, Tibetan exile organisations have valued independence from other agents, such as the CTA, but also from foreign wellwishers who have funded their activities. In view of the various qualities attributed to civil society – qualities that supposedly strengthen democratisation processes and deepen democracy – NGOs have been favoured recipients of operational assistance from governments, democracy promoters and other NGOs, and these aid agencies have expected a lot from civil society.81 Civil society has been especially favoured in programmes promoting democracy, and foreign organisations, such as NED, the Heinrich Bo¨ll Foundation, Friedrich Neumann Stiftung and USAID, have funded prodemocracy activities for Tibetan exiles. Some Tibetan interlocutors suggested that these sponsors presented specific demands to the organisations when financing projects. While the TYC expressed pride in the fact that they did not rely on earmarked money, at least one TYC leader, Tashi Phuntsok, was of the opinion that other organisations were in the pockets of their donors: Most Tibetan NGOs are run by foreign funding. TYC does not want the terms to be dictated, but wants to be independent. Some organisations are funded solely by foreign organisations, and their policy and their stance are also decided by those funds.82 This statement, regardless of its validity, reflects how self-conscious these organisations have been. They seem to understand that no gift from a donor is for free, and they know well the dominant discourse on the importance of civil society in a liberal democracy. Moreover, it points to the possibility that the gift of democracy can possibly assume a new identity in the way that it may be disenchanted and alienated from its donor, and transformed into a commodity. Tashi Phuntsok indicated that some organisations can be accused of turning the gift into a commodity, when they, for utilitarian reasons, have evoked the

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democracy discourse in order to raise funds. These patrons might use Tibetan exiles for their own policy objectives, such as democracy promotion. Several informants told me that since Samdhong Rinpoche became prime minister in 2001, he, knowing that there was no such thing as a free gift, has tried to minimise this dependency and cut the obligations that patrons have placed on their financial support.83 ExileTibetan groups and organisations have nonetheless been dependent upon the CTA for gaining access to funds.84 Moreover, pro-democracy programmes have often been coordinated by the Department of Finance’s Social and Resource Development Fund (spyi tshogs yar rgyas thebs rtsa), which has distributed external funding from abroad. It has sent suitable project proposals to foreign NGOs, knowing what their budgets are and what kind of projects they want to support. Foreign NGOs, on the other hand, have had their own purposes and ideas, only some of which have been acceptable for the Social and Resource Development Fund. It is in particular these relationships to sponsors and the CTA as a proxy state that have embarrassed some of the Dharamsala democrats that I met in the organisations, because these connections have potentially compromised their neo-Tocquevillean ideals. All three initiatives have idealised the concept of civil society and its pivotal role in the democratisation process. However, although they were working for the same cause, they have had different visions about their individual role as an actor in a non-state public sphere. They have viewed themselves and each other in instrumental terms, evaluating the role they play in the freedom movement and in the democratisation process. In fact, the overall impression in a neoTocquevillean perspective is that the work done by these organisations and the way that they organise constitute, in many respects, an exemplary case. The ideal-type civil society is understood to entail associations that perform crucial social and political functions supposedly supporting democracy. Social roles which are considered to be promoted within the realm of civil society include that of being a reservoir of caring, cultural life and intellectual innovation; teaching people the skills of citizenship and leadership; nurturing collective norms and promoting

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collective action for the common good.85 Among the crucial political roles within civil society are efforts to counterweight state and corporate power; promote accountability and other aspects of ‘good governance’; and protect a public sphere in which citizens can debate the ends and means of governance.86 Ideally, civil society provides channels through which people can make their voices heard in government decision-making processes and influence the formulation and implementation of policies. Civil society can be a fertile ground for intellectual innovation, development of collective norms, political awakening and platforms for reflection and debate. This positive view of civil society entails the entrenchment model in Mosher’s taxonomy, in which civil society impacts value diversity and works as a counterweight to the establishment.87 The neo-Tocquevillean ideal, as described above, has influenced the self-perception, the objectives and the roles of the Tibetan civil society actors in India – it is a neo-Tocquevillean civil society by design. Democratisation in the Tibetan case has been a top-down process where the organisations have acted as negotiating partners, while at the same time they have been limited by the CTA and exileTibetan political culture in general, for instance when the TYC and TWA have been careful to point to the Dalai Lama to legitimise their policies, or when YFBD chose to run their campaigns anonymously. These organisations and initiatives that have taken place in the public sphere have created platforms for political awakening, experience and education for grassroots-level perceptions regarding what it means to be a Tibetan, a patriot and a democrat. Furthermore, we have seen that the Tibetan organisations generally have served as examples for the public to follow, but also as platforms where people could discuss democracy and gain hands-on experience with democratic practice on a smaller scale. Scholars, pro-democracy promoters and Tibetan organisations alike have viewed civil society as beneficial, if not indispensable, to democratic development. And if the quantity of Tibetan exile organisations and their activities are any indication of the degree of democratisation, then democracy must be thriving in Dharamsala.88

CHAPTER 4 A PLACE FOR BUDDHISM IN DEMOCRACY?

Democratisation processes in Asia have been problematised with regard to whether Asian cultures and religions constitute underlying cultural barriers to democratisation. Whether labelled as a set of ‘Asian values’ or anti-democratic traditions, they have been utilised to explain a general reluctance towards democracy in Asia, and in particular point towards the failed attempts to consolidate democracy in East and South East Asia.1 The argument against any form of Asian exceptionalism, however, is that democracy does not demand any specific cultural prerequisites, nor is it related to any specific territory. In fact, there are scholars and politicians who have aimed to prove how an ethics of democracy can be found within elements of Confucianism, Islam and Buddhism. For instance, Friedman has argued that authoritarian cultures do not constitute an unbreakable barrier to democracy, and, furthermore, that democracy can be accommodated.2 Religion has frequently been placed at the centre of inquiries into Tibetan exile politics, asking whether or in what ways Buddhism – as representing Tibetan culture – obstructs or complies with democracy. From one perspective, democracy the Tibetan way is deemed a pale imitation of full-blown democracy when measuring how far it is from Euro-American ideals of secular democracy. For instance, in the studies by Ardley and Roemer, both scholars point to

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the interference of religion into politics as the main obstacle to a full realisation of democracy.3 However, from another perspective, many features of Tibetan Buddhist culture have been deemed compatible with democracy in view of Buddhism’s egalitarian and humanistic principles. In that regard, the Dalai Lama is of the opinion that Buddhism is consistent with democracy, and this suggests that Tibetan democracy need not necessarily be formulated upon any conflict between religion and politics.4 In fact, several Asian cases argue against a natural or inherent affinity between modernisation, democratisation and secularisation. As demonstrated in the edited volume by Bubandt and van Beek on the varieties of secularism in Asia, democratic reforms may rouse rather than restrict the entanglement of the spiritual with the political and may release new forms of secularism, as well as revitalise the spiritual in the public sphere.5 And when Tibetans translate democracy, they often imagine and discuss what a Tibetan variant of secularism might be by orienting themselves not only toward Western ideals, but also circulating Indian and Chinese translations of secularism. It is clear that the categories of the religious, the political and the secular have to be investigated as to what constitutes them and how they might be demarcated, since, in the words of Calhoun: ‘the demarcation between religion and the secular is made not just found’.6 The majority of Tibetans see chos, or Buddhism,7 as essential for defining the Tibetan nation and a pan-Tibetan identity. Since Buddhism is regarded by many Tibetans as the very essence of what is considered to be Tibetan, they look in horror towards the persecution of chos in Tibet by the secular Chinese state. The fundamentalist atheism of the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) when any display of religion was forbidden and most of the monasteries in Tibet were destroyed has stirred up strong images in the collective memory of Tibetans. And although the Chinese state under Deng Xiaoping’s reform period allowed some degree of religious revitalisation, the secular Chinese state has always attempted to restrain religion according to its political aims.8 The state, seeing religion as closely connected to Tibetan nationalism, has banned religious symbols

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representing the Tibetan nation, exerted control and surveillance in monasteries, submitted its inhabitants to political education and forced Tibetans to denounce the Dalai Lama. Even state attempts to incorporate the spiritual in state practice, for instance by authorising and participating in TV-transmitted religious rituals like the election of the eleventh Panchen Lama, must be analysed within a framework of the state goal of securing the political order in China.9 In a Tibetan perspective, the secularisation pushed forward in Tibet by Chinese authorities has been a persecution of Tibetan culture, amounting to what the Dalai Lama describes as a ‘cultural genocide’ (bod mi rigs rig gzhung bcas pa rtsa brlag tu ’gro).10 Thus, for many Tibetans, Chinese secularism has been ‘anti-chos’. Therefore, when Tibetans imagine and negotiate modern Tibetan governance, they take great care to distance themselves from the modernisation project of the secular Chinese government. Effectively, the issue of secularisation, which in the West has for a long time been perceived as the twin of democratisation, has proven to be problematic for Tibetans. The result has been multiple secularisms which circulate in exile and varying understandings of what the proper place of chos in Tibetan polity and politics might be.11 The categories that Tibetans have to grapple with, i.e. ‘the secular’, ‘secularisation’ and ‘secularism’, are moreover contested and slippery notions with a particular European origin,12 which according to the many theories circulating about modernisation, purportedly have global value and relevance.13 As one of the dimensions of modernity, as discussed in the Introduction, secularisation is also a basic assumption about democracy. Casanova provides an excellent overview of these three categories ‘the secular’, ‘secularisation’ and ‘secularism’, and problematises their inherent relation and very different uses.14 The first, the modern epistemic category ‘secular’, constructs, orders and comprehends a reality which is distinguished from its opposite other, ‘the religious’. It has become, Casanova explains, a central ‘theologicalphilosophical, legal-political, and cultural-anthropological’ category.15 The second, the process of political, social and cultural ‘secularisation’, refers to the thesis or the historical process of transformation and separation of ‘the secular’ and ‘the religious’. Casanova identifies three

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processes of secularisation, namely institutional differentiation of secular spheres; the progressive decline of religious beliefs and practices; and the privatisation of religion in the modern world. The third, the political doctrine ‘secularism’, refers broadly to worldviews and ideologies which may be consciously held and explicitly elaborated into philosophies of history and normative-ideological state projects, into projects of modernity and cultural programs, or, alternatively, it may be viewed as an epistemic knowledge regime that may be held unreflexively or be assumed phenomenologically as the taken-for-granted normal structure of modern reality, as a modern doxa or an unthought.16 When Tibetans grapple with these concepts and discuss the ways in which they can relate these to Tibetan democracy and modernity, they are very much aware of its foreign origin and, for some, this is part of the problem. This awareness, Casanova reminds us in a general context, should be at the starting point of any discussion of secularisation beyond its Euro-American origin: first it is necessary to recognise that the categories of ‘the secular’ and ‘the religious’ are products of Western secular modernity, but when treating them outside of this context, one should ‘allow a less Eurocentric comparative analysis of patterns of differentiation and secularisation in other civilizations and world religions.’17 One will observe, as Casanova and others have already done, that modernisation processes are not necessarily, even unlikely, accompanied by a process of religious decline.18 What we cannot predict, then, are the multifarious ways in which religion has come to occupy divergent positions and has taken on multiple meanings in the processes and projects of modernisation. This chapter, thus, focuses on the double-bind of politics and religion. The friction that arises between religion and politics is mostly based upon the manner in which Tibetan exiles formulate their pan-Tibetan identity as resting upon chos, or religion, and point towards chos to forge a continuation with the past. The question,

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therefore, is whether politics intertwined with religion is even possible within democratisation, and whether the formulation of a Tibetan modernity necessarily has to involve secularisation. Modernity is not something fixed but is caught in a continuous process of translation in which Tibetan exiles grapple with these questions. They debate the configuration of religion and politics, the various interpretations of secularism and the proper place of Buddhism in relation to Tibetan politics and polity. Discussions with Tibetan exiles have revealed how problematic it is to distinguish between the spheres of the spiritual and the temporal, between religion and politics, chos and srid. For some Tibetans, it is not even necessary or possible to relegate Buddhism’s proper place within or outside of polity and politics. In fact, secular democracy does not necessarily involve any privatisation of religion, decline of religious belief, or restrained religion. Therefore, not only do we see ‘multiple secularisms’ in Europe where the concept originated and a ‘variety of secularisms’ in Asia,19 but even within a single society of people – who purportedly share the same culture and history, and speak the same language – manifold secularisms are articulated. In the following section I shall present how Tibetan exiles perceive traditional Tibetan governance combining chos and politics in pre1951 Tibet. This in turn influences the ways in which democracy, both in polity and in politics, is imagined by Tibetan exiles. It will be clear that they do not unambiguously remember traditional Tibetan governance as harmonious or infallible, but that the centrality of chos also causes uneasiness among some Tibetans. I then focus on one case of evident multiplicity relating to the imaginations and interpretations of the epistemic category ‘secular’ and the political doctrine ‘secularism’, and the process of political, social and cultural ‘secularisation’. Tibetans have discussed these concepts in terms of whether governance that is secular can be Tibetan at all, and whether secularism can benefit the Tibetan cause. I will give a short introduction to an especially heated debate on secularism that took place in 1991 in the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, before turning to contemporary conceptions among Tibetans regarding the proper place of chos in society.

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The traditional way Democracy is often experienced by Tibetans as an effect of (what I in the Introduction described as) the ‘modern moment’,20 i.e. the birth of exile that is simultaneously seen as a break with the past and the introduction of modernity realised in two projects: modern education and democracy. In contrast, the traditional state polity and its politics are remembered as the yoke of chos and srid in a unique, historical Tibetan set-up called chos srid zung ’brel – ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ – that has been expressed as a Tibetan state ideology, value orientation and organisational principle. In the official narrative, the bind between chos and srid, religion and politics, has historical roots that stretch back to the first Buddhist king of Tibet, Songtsen Gampo (609 –49), or at least the Ganden Phodrang government instituted by the Fifth Dalai Lama (1617– 82) in 1642, and headed by the Dalai Lamas until the Chinese takeover.21 In modern Tibet, the most powerful government office was the council of ministers (bka’ shag).22 This council consisted of one monk and three lay officials (zhabs pad or bka’ blon) who had equal authority and who ruled by consensus.23 The council administered and made policies in addition to settling cases. It also mediated and controlled every secular case passed from other offices to the ruler. It furthermore convened different kinds of assemblies to deliberate on specific issues.24 Religious and monastic affairs were under the authority of the ‘monk governor’ (spyi khyab mkhan po), who was superior to the religious council (yig tshang) which was headed by four ‘great monk officials’ (drung yig chen mo). The connecting link between the ruler and the government offices was the office of the ‘great minister’ (blon chen), but it had no substantial influence on political affairs.25 There was a fixed number of lay officials (shod skor) and monk officials (rtse skor) in the approximately 20 other government offices of the Ganden Phodrang. 175 lay officials were recruited from the aristocracy, who had to send one male to serve as a ‘government servant’ (gzhung zhabs).26 Monk officials were usually recruited from middle-class and land-holding families and were registered at one of the ‘three seats’ (gdan sa gsum), i.e. the three largest monasteries of the

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Gelug lineage around Lhasa.27 They could also be selected from among bright monk students from monasteries.28 Though officially in charge of religious and monastic affairs, monk officials also had considerable influence in secular affairs. The Ganden Phodrang was dominated by only one of the Tibetan Buddhist traditions, the Gelug, and the Dalai Lama, the regents and the monk officials invariably belonged to this lineage. Tibetan exiles widely believe the Tibetan state ideology of the Ganden Phodrang pre-1951 was ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ‘brel). There are, however, several understandings of this Tibetan maxim.29 Seyfort Ruegg has rendered it as ‘syzygy of Dharma and Regnum.’30 Tibetans whom I have spoken with expressed it as ‘religion and politics hand in hand’, and ‘the mix of religion and politics’. Even the then speaker of the parliament-in-exile, Samdhong Rinpoche, suggested in 1991 that ‘politics guided by dharma’, was the most suitable English equivalent.31 Religion and politics, which in the largely secularised systems such as those found in Europe and often perceived as opposites, are not interchangeable with the Tibetan chos srid. Chos is not exactly the same as religion, and likewise, the concept of srid is not an exact equivalent to the English ‘politics’ but has, for many Tibetans, not only political connotations.32 On the one hand, srid refers to transmigratory existence (Skt saMsa¯ra) and the mundane; _ on the other hand, srid refers to the political realm, the government or ‘the art of government’, and is often treated as synonymous to ‘politics’ (chab srid).33 Regardless of nuances in translation, the popular interpretation of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ expresses a close relationship between the spiritual and the temporal, religion and politics, chos and srid. When Tibetan exiles refer to the pair chos and srid, it is obvious that the borders between these concepts are fluid, and at times they overlap. Sometimes, however, the religious and the political are expressed as two separate orders that run parallel and cover different aspects of life. It is obvious for most Tibetans, that, as separate orders with different identities, chos occupies a higher status than srid. This is because, as 38-year-old Choegon Rinpoche once explained to me, ‘srid is related to a single human life only, whereas chos is concerned

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about the lives after lives’. At times, however, it is apparent that Tibetan exiles talk about chos and srid as merged into one entity, so that one – usually srid – is expressed by integrating the other – chos. An example is when a Buddhist monk practises politics. Because the source of his political acts is chos, he is able to use his political power and authority to make decisions that will benefit everybody. It is the term zung ‘brel in the concept of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ that defines what kind of relationship there is between chos and srid. This has been translated as ‘merged,’ ‘united’, ‘together’ and ‘combined’. According to Choegon Rinpoche, zung ‘brel means that they influence one another: Now, as for chos srid zung ‘brel, it is not a question of chos and srid becoming blended together. The term zung ‘brel means that there is something to gain from both parts. One helps the other. An example is when the Dalai Lama says that Tibetan Buddhism has different sects, such as Sakya, Kagyu, Nyingma and Gelug. They are not mixed with one another . . . likewise, we have to understand the characteristics of each one without mixing them. If their individual characteristics are mixed up, then we will not know the characteristics of any of them. Basically their roots are the same. They all have the same roots, but still they are not blended. It is the same when we talk about chos srid zung ‘brel.34 The ways in which chos and srid can mutually benefit one another nonetheless remain unclear. More precisely, the benefit that chos adds to srid is apparently not reciprocated. In fact, Choegon Rinpoche, as well as others with whom I spoke, did not mention any benefits that chos may receive from srid. Moreover, it is evident that the ideals expressed by ‘merged spiritual law and politics’, such as ensuring good politics, do not describe actual governance throughout Tibetan history. The discrepancies between the ideals invoked by ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ and the reality of Tibet’s past have provoked criticisms from some Tibetan exiles. Furthermore, how this materialises in practice is also appraised differently. For some,

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‘merged spiritual law and politics’ constitutes the system, the infrastructure of the administration, the offices and the institutions; for others, it is something within individuals, similar to a personal quality or an ethical maxim. It is obvious that there is confusion regarding whether it refers to an ethical concept, to institutional structures or both. For instance, Hortsang Jigme, a Tibetan intellectual and former MP, has explained ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ as ‘a person who understands and undertakes both chos and srid perfectly’. However, he also identified it as ‘a system of governance based upon the doctrine of religious traditions’.35 Furthermore, Tibetan exiles single out several features of the pre-1951 Ganden Phodrang government as examples of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ in Tibet. These include, in particular, the Dalai Lama institution, the government’s patronage of Buddhism, the monastic influence in governance, and the individual monks’ involvement in politics. Generally, when Tibetan exiles describe the Ganden Phodrang, the institution of the Dalai Lama is seen as a manifestation of the connection between chos and srid. This is because of his dual role as the foremost religious and political authority for Tibetans. It is the institution of the Dalai Lama that in exile has become the key symbol of the Tibetan nation and the Ganden Phodrang. Many Tibetans today will also point to the government’s general patronage of Buddhism as an expression of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’, believing that it was of primary importance for the Ganden Phodrang to support Buddhism.36 However, although religious priority was generally accepted in Tibet, there was no unanimity as to what were the best conditions for chos and Tibet, and this was potentially a cause for intra-religious conflicts and clashes between monastic colleges and the government. This brings us to a feature commonly highlighted as an expression of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’, namely the political involvement of different monastic colleges, and the fact that they competed fiercely with each other over political influence.37 In line with this, it is a common perception that chos and srid were mixed because monks, having great political concern and interest in political affairs, acted as politicians and held seats in the government reserved for them.

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These four features, namely the Dalai Lama institution, the government’s patronage of Buddhism, the monastic influence in governance and the individual monks’ involvement in politics, were commonly pointed towards as examples of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ by my Tibetan interlocutors. Surprisingly, few Tibetans that I have spoken with claimed that the Ganden Phodrang government of the past used chos as an ethical guideline in decision-making, which is, for instance, Samdhong Rinpoche’s interpretation of chos srid zung ‘brel. Moreover, nobody pointed out that the government conferred with oracles as a sign of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’.38 Hence, it is apparent that the relationship between chos and srid is not without tensions. For example, religion’s influence in politics, together with the nobility’s power, has been accused by many Tibetans of upholding hierarchies, class differences and discrimination in pre-1951 Tibet. Similarly, some have expressed how the conservative religious forces, out of fear of losing their power and resources, have hampered modern reforms which were initiated under the leadership of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama (such as secular education and the development of a modern army) and continued in exile by the current Fourteenth Dalai Lama (such as democratisation). A senior monk at Sera Jey Monastery in South India, Tenzin Woebar, argued that the majority of the pre-1951 Tibetans were focused on chos while neglecting srid. He told me that the imbalance between chos and srid was the reason why Tibet succumbed to China.39 While his view mirrors that of many Tibetan exiles, not everybody would agree with him that the very same trouble in the past was a reason why a proper, balanced working of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ is important in the present and the future; others have argued the opposite: that it proved why it is necessary to abandon ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ in modern Tibetan polity and politics. This disagreement over what chos srid zung ‘brel means and what its consequences have been has also been invoked in today’s discussions over the definition of democracy, to which I will turn in the following sections: first, how secularism has been discussed in the parliament in 1991 and, then, the general discussion over the

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compatibility between democracy and Buddhism and the role of the clergy in governance.

Competing secularisms What is the Tibetan counterpart to the English term ‘secular’ and what are the consequences for the Tibetan exile and the Tibetan cause of adopting and implementing an ideal of secular democracy? These questions were at the top of the agenda when the eleventh parliament-in-exile during its spring session in 1991 discussed how to define the Tibetan polity. When the draft for the new charter was presented to the newly established and reformed parliamentin-exile, the term chos lugs ris med (‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’, in the sense that one religious tradition is not favoured over the others), appeared as the Tibetan equivalent to the English term ‘secular’ in article 3. In the Tibetan-language charter draft, article 3 described ‘the nature of Tibetan polity’ (chab srid kyi rang bzhin) as such: The future Tibetan polity shall uphold the non-violence principle of the Buddha’s teachings and shall endeavour to be a republic embracing democracy, chos lugs ris med [‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’], social welfare and freedom. The polity of the Tibetan exiles shall also conform to that.40 In his opening speech to the parliament, the Dalai Lama referred to the term chos lugs ris med in the draft as a translation of the English term ‘secular’ and asked the parliamentarians to consider using this term.41 He explained that the English term ‘secularism’ could be understood in two ways: the appropriate interpretation was chos lugs ris med (‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’) as the draft said, but some nations, the Dalai Lama added, understood secularism as a political system where chos was absent (chos med ring lugs). The Dalai Lama furthermore said that while the former incorporated the essence of all chos, the latter was an alternative interpretation going against the Tibetan tradition and the realities that the Tibetans were

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facing.42 He therefore suggested that the Tibetans defined their polity as secular in the sense that it was impartial towards chos. This definition of secularism as chos lugs ris med (‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’) as suggested by the Dalai Lama establishes secularism as the equal consideration of all religions rather than the exclusion of religion from the public sphere. This definition of secularism as the equal consideration of all religions was also a prevalent Indian interpretation of secularism. Some Tibetans have oriented themselves to the Indian model when they translated the English ‘secular’ to an appropriate Tibetan equivalent, claiming that this concept embodies an understanding of secularism that was promoted by Mahatma Gandhi through the words sarva dharma sambhava.43 Sarva dharma sambhava could in effect be understood as ‘multi-religious co-existence’, and it has been endorsed as a tool for incorporating the different religious groups within the definition of the Indian nation and national culture. Sarva dharma sambhava served as a principle that ideally recognised India as a multi-religious nation, where affinity to religious groups should be downplayed, and one’s loyalty to the nation highlighted. The antonym for this understanding of secularism is communalism, meaning that, in this case, religious groups put the interests of their group above the interests of society as a whole, hence threatening the unity of the nation.44 The Dalai Lama’s speech to the parliament in 1991 was followed by lengthy discussions in parliament on the issue of secularism. First of all, the connotations of ‘secular’ were translated differently by the delegates, i.e. from the English term ‘secular’ which the Dalai Lama mentioned in his speech into several Tibetan terms. The alternative Tibetan translations of secularism mentioned during these discussions included, for example, ‘individual choice of one’s religious beliefs’ (chos dad rang mos), ‘disregarding chos’ (chos la ltos med), ‘refuting chos’ (chos la dgag bya byed), ‘opposing chos’ (chos la ’gal ba) and ‘being without chos’ (chos med). Several apprehensions expressed among the parliamentarians were based on an understanding of secularism as being a political system where chos was absent. Secularism, for them, meant that one had to refute, be against or be

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without the Buddhist chos – the very essence of what is considered to be Tibetan.45 The majority of the parliamentarians who interpreted secularism as a ‘system without chos’ (chos med ring lugs), which also resounds with the widespread Weberian definition of secularism as a separation of value spheres, deemed this kind of secularism at odds with the paradigm of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ’brel) that the majority wished to protect in exile.46 Moreover, some even interpreted secular as ‘anti-chos’ and equated this with Maoism or communism. Thus, adopting secularism in contemporary Tibetan governance would, in this perspective, be like parroting Chinese governance that was threatening to annihilate chos inside Tibet. The debate evolved into a fight between secularism versus ‘merged spiritual law and politics’. There was even a suggestion by the delegate Pema Dechen that neither concept should be mentioned in the charter, so that confusion and various interpretations of the meanings and implications of secularism and ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ would be avoided.47 Secondly, the delegates infused different meanings into the Tibetan concept ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’ (chos lugs ris med) that the Dalai Lama and the draft committee had suggested as an appropriate Tibetan version of secularism. Samdhong Rinpoche wanted the parliamentarians to see secularism from a Tibetan perspective and base their interpretation of the secular on that.48 In a way, both the Dalai Lama and Samdhong Rinpoche asked the parliament to recognise that the English ‘secular’ had to be translated sensitively to Tibetan culture and their affinity for chos. Samdhong Rinpoche insisted that there could be secularism ‘the Tibetan way’, just like other countries had their own definitions of secularism. He appealed to the parliament to understand that Tibetan secularism was ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’, i.e. Gandhian-inspired secularism. One of the parliamentarians who supported this interpretation was Namgyal Wangdu, a former MP and retired soldier, whom I met in 2006 in Dekyiling. Although he was a religious man, he personally supported the definition of Tibetan polity as ‘secular’ in the charter, because he wanted to prevent intrareligious conflicts:

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I was completely for ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’ [chos lugs ris med ]. It’s not like I don’t have chos. Chos is there, but we have an old saying in Tibet: ‘chos and the physical world are different entities [chos dang ’jig rten gnyis khag khag so so yin ]’. I usually say that. Chos is chos . . . Basically, it is not good that representatives enter the parliament in the name of chos. I wanted ‘impartiality with regard to religious tradition’, and I expressed such a wish. It isn’t ‘no-chos’ . . . The context for me saying this is that in our history, the Buddhist schools fought one another for power. Many people took part in these battles, many monasteries were destroyed, and the citizens suffered a lot. In the name of chos, through this power, there had been many different incidents similar to this in history. Based on these circumstances, I spoke up. Not for any other reason.49 Apprehensions expressed during parliamentary discussions related how religious delegates (chos lugs kyi sku tshab) would lose their seats in the parliament, and that the Department of Religion and Culture would be closed if the nature of polity was to be predicated on the idea of secularism.50 For these delegates, making the Tibetan government secular was equal to ‘obstructing the path of chos’. Others, however, feared that the international community would cease supporting the CTA if they explicitly embraced religious polity and politics through ‘merged spiritual law and politics’, because it could be misinterpreted as taking up non-democratic theocratic governance. Elsewhere I have distinguished between three different translations of secularism put forward by proponents that I have called the encompassers, the displacers or the traditionalists.51 The encompassers, which include the Dalai Lama, Samdhong Rinpoche, Lobsang Sangay, the representatives of many Dharamsala associations and influential intellectuals invite religion into the political sphere, advocate ‘impartiality with regard to religious tradition’ (chos lugs ris med) and ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ’brel). The displacers argue for a ‘system without chos’ (chos med ring lugs) and want to move religion out of the political sphere. They work towards disenchanting democracy and try to treat democracy as a

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secular entity. Finally, the most forceful voices, as it turned out in 1991, apparently belonged to the ‘traditionalists’ who are opposed to any kind of secularism and want to keep to what they perceive as a traditional Tibetan way of governing in which chos and srid are integrated. I have chosen to call them traditionalists not because they actually keep to any pre-defined tradition, but because they claim to protect a Tibetan tradition: chos – seen as identical to Buddhism – has to be protected, since it is the core of the Tibetan culture and identity. In the end, none of the terms expressing an idea of secularism were mentioned in the final Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile published in 1991. Instead, the MPs voted in favour of inserting ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ‘brel) in the description of the nature of the polity without any reference to secularism, no matter how it was interpreted in Tibetan.52 It was thus the traditionalists who won the battle over how to define the nature of a contemporary Tibetan polity. Since the description of the Tibetan exile polity was decided upon, there seems to be an agreement amongst Tibetans not to have any public debate on the issue of secularism and the role of religion in politics. One of those who had settled with this consensus was Karma Choephel, an Utsang representative in the parliament (since 1991) who had been educated at the University of Delhi, and who was publicly well known from his role in the TYC leadership group (1977– 83, 1986– 9) and as the first president of the National Democratic Party of Tibet (1994). When we spoke in 2007, he was the speaker of parliament, and he explained during our conversation: When we were debating [the charter draft] at that time, I was quite passionate about secularism. Of course I am a very religious person, but religion is something individual, you see. You should not bring it in to the public and mix it with politics; that I didn’t like. But now, over the years, discussing and thinking more of this, I think it is better to leave it as chos srid zung ‘brel [‘merged spiritual law and politics’] as long as we are in exile, because if you raise it again, this will create unnecessary controversies, problems and divisions in the

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Tibetan society. So let it go on. When the time comes for us to go back to Tibet, then things will be very different . . . So let that time come, and in the meantime, if everybody is happy, there’s no big harm in that.53 Karma Choephel had temporarily accepted that this Weberian approach to democracy which advocated the privatisation of religion and the institutionalisation of religion and politics into separate spheres had to be toned down to avoid upsetting the exile community. Similarly, many Tibetans have told me that during these critical times in exile, a public debate on secularism might very well cause unrest and grievances among Tibetan exiles – even disunite them. Defining Tibetan polity as secular has therefore not been pursued any further, and the issue has not been placed on the public agenda. Although there are multiple understandings of Tibetan secularism circulating today, many Tibetans seem to admit that the time is not ripe to air these tensions in public. The understanding of secularism which is suggested in the charter draft, ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’, nonetheless appears to have gained territory among Tibetan intellectuals. Many intellectuals, such as Tibetan researchers, writers and other social commentators audible in the public sphere, understand secularism as a kind of non-sectarianism in their interpretation of secularism as ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’. For some, this nonsectarianism means that there is no state religion, in the sense that the state does not favour one sect over others but respects and treats all as equals.54 Among its advocates are the significant voices of Samdhong Rinpoche and the former speaker of parliament Pema Jungne. Lobsang Sangay, during the swearing-in ceremony as primeminister-in-exile on 8 August 2011, also declared that it was this kind of a secular democracy that he was striving for: ‘I vow to accomplish the aspirations of His Holiness to build a genuine secular [chos lugs ris med ] democratic society.’55 The same terminology of non-sectarianism is also put forward by representatives of influential NGOs. However, I have found that some representatives of the TYC give what at times seem like trained answers to questions on

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secularism in accordance with the discourse promoting secularism as ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’; yet they distinguished between ‘how it is’ and what they personally believed, which usually supported a separation of religion and politics. Thus, privately they looked towards the ideal of separating church and state. As representatives of associations they may have felt obliged to reproduce dominant discourse on secularism as impartiality, but my research also suggests that those who silently understood secularism to be along the lines of Weber’s thesis of a separation of value spheres but voiced a Gandhian secularism of impartiality, were under the impression that it was difficult to turn the exile polity into a Weberian secular democracy, even though they might personally believe it is the right thing to do. A current interpretation of the phrase chos lugs ris med (‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’) is moreover often likened to ‘individual choice of one’s religious beliefs’ (chos dad rang mos), that in other contexts has been translated as ‘freedom of religion’. The phrase points to the individual’s right to practise a religious belief of his or her own choice or not practise at all. In some instances, it has also meant that religion should be relegated to the private sphere. I have encountered Tibetans who, while explaining their understanding of secularism, used these two phrases interchangeably or mixed up the two. For several of those promoting this discourse, the individual freedom of religion and the government’s equal treatment and respect of religions are two sides of the same coin. It was of great importance for those who favoured the Indian model of ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’ (chos lugs ris med) to let others understand that Tibetan secularism did not need to be a question of ‘kicking out chos’ from the political sphere. Instead, they expanded the Indian model and made it fit Tibetan concerns, claiming that ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’ would accord chos great importance, because the government’s duty to protect chos without distinction was recognised within such a polity. Thus, this form of secularism suggests that a Tibetan modernity needs not necessarily be formulated upon any conflict between religion and politics. This brings us to the issue of

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how it might be possible, even necessary, for Tibetan polity and politics to be guided by or fused with the teachings of the Buddha. Furthermore, in which ways might these understandings of secularism conform with ideas about democracy, such as those expressed by many Tibetans and confirmed by the majority of the parliamentarians in 1991 when they decided to remove ‘impartiality with regard to religious traditions’ from the charter draft and replace it with ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ – chos srid zung ’brel? Apparently, these parliamentarians thought this would be according to the wishes of the Tibetan public whom they represented. Karma Choephel commented: When you discuss chos srid zung ’brel and chos lugs ris med [impartiality with regard to religious traditions], then the majority, the high majority are for chos srid zung ’brel. Not from any political ideology, but only because they love religion! Buddhism!56 In this view, the MPs were thus correct when they argued in 1991 that the majority of Tibetans were in favour of retaining the paradigm of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ’brel). If it was not because they ‘love religion’, then because they know that it is well-nigh impossible to disintegrate ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ and separate spiritual law from Tibetan polity even when it was deemed to be democratic. Democracy with Buddhism? Politics without chos is ‘dirty politics’, I have been told time and again. In this way, several interlocutors distinguished between chos and srid in order to argue that politics infused with Buddhism could cleanse politics of its impurity in two ways. One common point of reference was acutely expressed by 30-year-old disrobed monk Lhagpa Tsering. He contrasted the Dalai Lama, who represents chos, with Hitler, who was a politician (chab srid pa). They are absolute opposites, Lhagpa Tsering concluded.57 Similar arguments replaced Hitler with Mao. Farmer Dorje Phuntsok, for instance, offered this

Figure 4.1 Sera Jey Monastery in Bylakuppe, where monks have left their shoes outside on the stairs while attending mass in the temple. A number of monasteries have been re-established in exile, and the monasteries Sera Mey and Sera Jey are home to 3,000 monks in Bylakuppe.

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explanation: ‘Religion and politics are totally different: The Dalai Lama says that power comes from compassion, while Mao says that power comes from the barrel of a gun.’58 The second reference I commonly came across was also used by Lhagpa Tsering to distinguish between politics as something lower than chos: ‘Politics’ (chab srid) is about securing one’s own pleasure, power, money and the likes in this life, but chos is about securing the happiness for all living beings, not only for this life but also the next. Farmer Dorje Phuntsok made a similar distinction between the self-interest of politicians and the all-embracing concern of religion, saying that ‘religion is losing self, gaining others. Politics is gaining self, losing others: rang pham mi thob, mi thob rang pham. Religion and politics are very much different.’ Moreover, he continued, ‘for everlasting happiness, religion is more powerful. For temporary happiness, then it is politics.’59 Many Tibetan interlocutors offered similar slogans to argue how politics have something to gain from Buddhism. Buddhist monks, for example, had special qualities as political leaders, and it would not be difficult for them to use these qualities within democracy, since democracy was compatible with Buddhism. The Dalai Lama and Samdhong Rinpoche are among the more prominent Tibetans who have deemed Buddhism and democracy compatible, and many Tibetans have also adopted this view arguing that they share many core values.60 Tashi Tsetan, a 35-year-old historian working at a Buddhist institute, used Abraham Lincoln’s famous line ‘of the people, by the people and for the people’ to explain the compatibility between democracy and Buddhism. He explained: Democracy, we say, is for the people, by the people and of the people. And religion, we say, is for the benefit of all sentient beings, so I think [democracy and Buddhism are] very compatible. Buddhism not only respects people, but it respects every living being. There are many similarities between democracy and Buddhism . . . If any of the views or ideas of democracy are against religion, His Holiness would think twice before democratising the Tibetan society. But democracy is

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something that Tibetans don’t really want or don’t really work after, but in many other countries we know from history that men lost their lives to run democracy. In the Tibetan community, [however], His Holiness gave democracy to the Tibetan people, because His Holiness knew that democracy respects people.61 When Tashi Tsetan said that democracy is for the benefit of the people and Buddhism for the benefit of all sentient beings, he echoed a popular slogan among many Tibetans in India. Tashi Tsetan furthermore explained that democracy was a gift from the Dalai Lama, knowing that the two are indeed compatible. Even then president of the secular party National Democratic Party of Tibet, Chemey Yungdrung, put this view forward when he pointed to the core democratic values of liberty, equality and fraternity within Tibetan Buddhism to make his point when we spoke in 2006: American democracy mentions three main things: liberty, equality and fraternity. I think fraternity is related to Buddhism in the sense of brotherhood, love, then the world will become more peaceful. Equality: even Buddhism says all living things are equal. There are two types of liberty. One liberty is democratic liberty, in the sense that you have your own liberty: whatever you think, whatever you do, whatever you express is a kind of self-liberty. Buddhist liberty is different, because it’s deeper than this liberty . . . I can’t say every person has to follow Buddhism, but some important points I think they should take from Buddhism [and apply] to democracy. It will make democracy more pure, and I think it will be really useful for the future world, [adding] more peace, you know.62 In fact, Chemey Yungdrung saw it as a task of his party to explain this compatibility to the Tibetan public. In my opinion, underscoring the compatibility between Buddhism and democracy can indeed be a way to urge Tibetans to understand and accept

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democracy. Moreover, by arguing that the Buddha’s teachings were attuned to democracy, the latter can be seen as something that already belongs to Tibetan culture. Thus, democratic values are linked to the Tibetan past. Some Tibetans made this link explicit during interviews by explaining how monasteries in pre-communist Tibet were democratic institutions, in that decisions were made by consensus. Even the Dalai Lama has pointed to this similarity.63 Therefore, the introduction of democracy in exile was no radical change, because Buddhism was already egalitarian, and decisionmaking was based on consensus among monks. In that way, as their argumentation goes, there are not many ideological differences between Buddhism and democracy. One interviewee, a 66-year-old senior teacher at Sera Mey Monastery in Bylakuppe, Yeshe Tsering, even compared the Dalai Lama’s introduction of democracy with that of the Buddha’s introduction of Buddhism.64 Only the more educated monks among the interviewees used similar analogies when they argued that Buddhism complied with democracy. Nonetheless, this sympathetic comparison between the two was something that I heard several times and was an image that many Tibetans promoted. Some Tibetans went further in their argumentation and supported Buddhist leaders’ involvement in politics. Tashi Tsetan, for example, believed that ‘Tibetans for hundreds of years have been led by a monk, by a religious figure, so we are used to it.’ He called it an ‘instinct’, since ‘if there is a rinpoche or lama65 who leads the state, we always respect them . . . because of the religious weight they carry.’66 He argued that Tibetans do not question the ability of religious figures to make political decisions that benefit the public. On the contrary, they believe that only a religious figure is able to use his political power to make decisions that will benefit everybody. Therefore: ‘Tibetans will never accept a lay person as a head of state.’ For a religious figure, it is the chos that naturally speaks out. Insight into chos makes one act in a good way, because it is the aim of Buddhism to ‘make man good’. In this respect, chos benefits srid by guiding and influencing srid. The prime exemplar is the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, whose authority as a religious figure and leader of the nation is indisputable amongst the majority of Tibetans. Very few question his enlightened leadership,

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and many Tibetans reluctantly accepted his devolution of political office in 2011. When it comes to the authority of democratically elected leaders, however, the matter is more complex. There are numerous examples of reincarnate lamas competing in elections and being appointed to political state offices in Ladakh, including the influential Bakula Rinpoche who served as MP in India and ambassador in Mongolia.67 Within the CTA in Dharamsala, the most prominent democratically elected political leader, who also represents chos, is Samdhong Rinpoche. Tibetan exiles chose this highly respected religious figure and intellectual as their first democratically elected prime-minister-in-exile in 2001 and 2006. It might be easier for people to trust a religious leader, argued Norbu Sampel, a 76-year-old retired soldier and civil servant living in Bylakuppe. Nonetheless, he continued, Samdhong Rinpoche was elected because of his qualifications, not only for representing chos: Basically, we respect him out of our faith in chos. Faith was not what got him elected, but his high education . . . If a person has such education of inner knowledge [nang gi shes yon ], then being a monk is not difficult or important, and it is not the one and only qualification. Nevertheless, a person without such knowledge won’t get elected.68 Likewise, very few objected to his election and several Tibetans confirmed that Samdhong Rinpoche was not elected due to his status as a monk but because he had excellent qualifications. Karma Senge, a 52-year-old teacher in Bylakuppe, considered Samdhong Rinpoche the best leader available. Not only was he an academic and statesman, but he had his religious education as an additional qualification. If Samdhong Rinpoche actually did win the election due to his rinpoche status, it was nevertheless a democratic and valid decision: Bka’ blon khris pa [the prime minister] has got as much right as me to be elected as a bka’ blon khris pa because of being a Tibetan. So a monk was chosen, but we can’t say that religion has taken the upper hand.

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Some would say he is chosen because he is a rinpoche. No, no, no. You ask: Who is more qualified than [Samdhong] Rinpoche? Rinpoche has got as much right to be chosen as a bka’ blon khris pa as any other Tibetan. It so happened, that he was a monk. He is a rinpoche. Nobody chose him because he is rinpoche. People who are educated, people who are impartial, they chose him because he is the best available person in the Tibetan community. Of course, he’s religious. He’s an academic. He’s a statesman. And he is a person who can take decisions . . . Basically being a monk is one additional quality that he has. He has this education of religion which makes him be more honest, more, you know, let us say god-fearing or trying to not do something which is harmful for others. So basically, a monk is an additional quality, not a quality which will make him a bad person. Even if bka’ blon khris pa has been chosen as a monk, he’s chosen by the Tibetan people, so you cannot grumble.69 The democratically elected prime minister, however, was not exempt from direct criticism, which was otherwise commonly the case with the Dalai Lama. Another man, Kunchok Tharchin, commented that although Samdhong Rinpoche is well-educated and a good PM, ‘of course, compared to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, nobody can shine’.70 Therefore, he believed Samdhong Rinpoche was targeted with criticism. Nonetheless, Kunchok Tharchin was convinced that Samdhong Rinpoche, whatever he did, was not doing it for himself. Others also pointed to the religiously inspired quality of Samdhong Rinpoche, that being a monk he had no self-interest, and that this positive quality steered his decision-making. Moreover, monks did not have obligations and burdens of family life, and therefore they could devote their life to higher causes. I discussed this in 2006 with Sonam Topgyal, a teacher with an MA in political science, who argued that generally Tibetans valued political decisions made by monks. It nonetheless did not mean that they were unable to evaluate whether a monk leader was doing a good job, as exemplified in the following interview transcript:

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What kind of qualities do you think he [Samdhong Rinpoche] possesses, since people have chosen him as their first democratically elected leader? Firstly, he has a lot of goodwill, and all people know he is an intelligent, wise man. Another reason is that he is a monk, and many people consider that a good monk as a leader is going to be good. We should have leaders who are not married, who don’t have a family to worry about. Why is that? Because if a leader, if he is alone, he doesn’t have to worry about anything else in this world: wife, family, kids, etc. Then it is presumed that he’s going to devote all of his life for the better cause. There’s no problem with electing a religious figure? No, we Tibetans don’t consider this as bad. A decision made by a person like Samdhong Rinpoche is considered to be quite good. It’s not based on self-interest, but then he is not a superman. He is just an ordinary person. A monk as a leader may make mistakes. So that has to be considered. I think people are not going to follow him blindfolded just because he is a monk. That he is always right, no, I think they don’t believe that. But if it was the Dalai Lama, would they? Yeah. I think most people, but not any more. [For example] His Holiness’s idea of dbu ma’i lam [Middle Way]: lots of people have different views now. Can you imagine that the Tibetans will democratically elect a leader who is a lay person? Yeah of course. His Holiness is a monk, the prime minister is a monk, but the rest of the members of the assembly are lay people, so it’s going to change. People are going to elect leaders based on their abilities, based on their experience, not just based on whether he’s a monk or not. This is going to change

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because people are being taught democracy, and then we are becoming more modern, modernised. I think it’s going to change.71 Several of my interviewees supported this observation. Norgye Tashi, a Tibetan intellectual working in McLeod Ganj, was convinced that Samdhong Rinpoche, although a respected lama and rinpoche, had never used his religious charisma to collect votes. Moreover, he argued, it was wrong to think that monkhood could generate support for one’s candidacy. Norgye Tashi rhetorically said: ‘The constitution didn’t demand any monk or lama. A citizen is demanded.’72 Many interviewees, also among the clergy, could easily imagine a lay person as prime minister, as long as he was devoted to the government and possessed qualities similar to Samdhong Rinpoche. When Samdhong Rinpoche’s two terms were about to end, there were fears among some Tibetans that there were no qualified candidates except the outgoing PM. In order to keep Samdhong Rinpoche in the post, some parliamentarians tried to pass a bill to abolish the charter’s article stipulating that a PM can only serve two consecutive terms. Neither he nor the parliament supported this, and in 2011, Tibetan exiles elected a new prime-minister-in-exile, Lobsang Sangay, who was a Harvard-educated lay man – and a religious man as well. It thus becomes obvious that the majority of the voting population do not think that it is necessary that the PM belong to the clergy, and at the same time they do not necessarily see any fault in including clergy in other political posts. Monk officials, monk parliamentarians and monk civil servants are, as some Tibetans argue, in any case indicative of Tibetan society’s character and composition. In that sense, it is very appropriate to have a rinpoche as a political leader within a democracy or a minister in maroon robes. Since a large part of the Tibetan population is clergy, it naturally follows that the clergy has the same rights as lay people and is represented in the democratic set-up. Moreover, their argumentation goes, monks and lay people are interested in the same problems, and both participate in the freedom struggle. Some even see the monasteries as constituencies in their own right. Because they

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comprise several thousand monks, they are like settlements in themselves. Therefore, representatives from monastic institutions in, for instance, the parliament could be compared to representatives from the various exile-Tibetan constituencies. Several lay Tibetans argued that monks were also Tibetan citizens who should have the right to stand for election, to fight for a seat in the parliament, or to become the prime minister. In contrast to this, there are also other Tibetans who maintain that secularisation of the administrative infrastructure is necessary, i.e. interpreting secularism in the Weberian sense of institutional differentiation. It might, however, seem that they are a minority – at least their discourse is not the dominant one expressed today. They are usually young and well-educated, some of them have studied political science, and many are actively engaged in the exile associations. It is obvious that some of the tensions revealed in the discussions of some of these issues seem to be based on an understanding of secularism in the Weberian sense, and that they either adopt this ideal (as a proof of being modern), or they struggle to find some indigenous alternative. Democracy disenchanted Understanding democratisation to be synonymous with secularisation or as a natural evolution of modernity, some Tibetans believe the next step in the democratisation process is to remove religion from the political sphere and keep politics and religion apart in line with dominant Weberian conceptualisations of secularism.73 From this viewpoint, it is necessary to strive for a secularisation that brings about a ‘system without chos’ (chos med ring lugs) in which religion is privatised. These Tibetans are not only inspired by German political science books, but also contemporary Tibetan intellectuals within their own community, such as the freedom fighters Lhasang Tsering and Jamyang Norbu who were ‘ahead of their time’ and therefore not able to change the system. Looking towards these role models, many Tibetan youth have hoped that their fellow Tibetans would mature to the changes envisioned in the political science textbooks they had studied at universities in Bangalore, Chandigarh, Delhi and

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New York. They have measured or compared Tibetan governance-inexile with their Euro-American ideals, and for them only a secular state – a state that is ‘without chos’ (chos med) – can ensure democratic governance. Secularism is, in this rationale, a question of separating church and state in the Weberian sense; however, this does not mean that there is no room for Buddhism within secular democracy. On the contrary, many argue that both democracy and Buddhism are important and beneficial, and that they share many core values. Thus, they are not driving the wedge between religion and politics too deeply, since Buddhism may inform democracy. In fact, democracy can be both secular and Buddhist, not in a religious sense understood to be based on superstition or going against rational thinking, but positioning Buddhism as a form of humanism which invokes an empathic dimension in a modern political system. Furthermore, among those who value secular democratic structures, some argue that merging politics and religion in the Tibetan polity is a serious obstacle to ‘true’ or ‘real’ democracy. Although there are several aspects to this argument, the one criticism that seems to take precedence is directed towards the religion– region template of the parliament. Many of those Tibetans who are in favour of a ‘system without religion’ perceived the current institutional set-up as a source of communalism in the sense of invoking sectarian tensions (revisited in detail in Chapter 6). They hope that to adopt the ideal of secularism as a ‘system without religion’ and abolish the paradigm of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’, which is understood to keep sectarianism (or ‘sectarian discord’ chos lugs kyi ’then khyer) and regionalism (or ‘regional discord’ chol kha gi ’then khyer) out of politics. They draw their argumentation from the common understanding that srid/ politics and chos/religion are different and should be kept separate. Since the current institutional set-up invites religion to interfere in politics, they argue, at least it should be discouraged by removing religion from the political structures. For some, secularisation should not confine itself to the institutional set-up. Since democracy gives the people power to decide what is best for the entire community, they argue that

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individuals should be able to make educated decisions without any interference from their personal religious conviction. Of course, nobody that I have spoken with believed that people should be forced to abandon their religion. They did not advocate atheism, but emphasised that it was essential that people use reason and not faith when they practise their democratic rights. I heard these arguments from Tibetans, both young and old, who were politically engaged, but who, when speaking out too loud, would be labelled troublemakers at a time when they should stick together and speak with a single voice (more in Chapter 6). Moreover, contrary to the argument that politics needs chos in order to be ethical, these same Tibetans whom I call ‘Tibetan critics’, have argued that the source of ethics does not have to be religion, and that religion is not the proper guide for politics. Modern education, hence, has been positioned as the answer for those who advocate that reason and ethics, not religion, should direct politics: The new generation of Tibetans should be given an education that makes them ‘open minded’, nurtures independent thinking and teaches how to apply critical analysis. Without such an education, Tibetans’ ‘blind faith’ will merely allow the authorities to dictate to the public and encourage undemocratic decision-making. An obvious example of such blind faith is the trust that Tibetans place in the Dalai Lama. Several Tibetan critics will agree with farmer Dorje Phuntsok in Bylakuppe, when he explained to me that Tibetans have always had ‘blind faith’ in the Dalai Lama, and that people believed the Dalai Lama is the government.74 Thus, they trusted the Dalai Lama and left all political responsibilities in his hands. Dorje Phuntsok, in his analysis, divided the exile-Tibetan population into three segments according to their dedication to the Dalai Lama. He estimated that one segment, comprising 35 per cent of Tibetan exiles, believed that the Dalai Lama is the reincarnation of the Buddhist deity Avalokites´vara, and therefore cannot make wrong decisions and thus should make all decisions. The second segment of 30 per cent does not confuse the Dalai Lama as a deity and the Dalai Lama as a politician. Nevertheless, they see no problem if the Dalai Lama manages decision-making on behalf of all Tibetans, and

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therefore they leave the duty of democracy up to him. Dorje Phuntsok, moreover, believed that the last 35 per cent, constituting the third segment who are active in organisations like TYC, have temporarily accepted that the Dalai Lama decides overall strategies, but they do not feel it is practical in the future. There are very few who say ‘no’ to the Dalai Lama’s policies, Dorje Phuntsok concluded. Some Tibetans see such faith and trust in the Dalai Lama as an impediment to democratisation. As long as democracy is top-down administered and the grassroots leave it to the Dalai Lama to make the decisions, democracy is not working. Pema Gyal from Youth for Better MPs has identified the Fourteenth Dalai Lama as a prime mover of democratisation among a people unfit to handle their democratic responsibilities and independence from the Dalai Lama’s divine insight: Till now we have not been democratic, even if we say we are democratic, because people do not use their brain. Democracy is all about using your own judgment. Right now it’s His Holiness’s [the Dalai Lama’s] judgment . . . Right now, people are saying ‘No, His Holiness, you decide. You decide whatever. We are behind you,’ and they don’t want to think.75 Similar judgments were made by Tibetans arguing for secularism as a ‘system without religion’. They claimed that democratic thinking was not yet a part of Tibetan political culture, because the Tibetans had ‘a very traditional mind set’ that was hindering ‘modern progress’. But when I presented this view to some of my other eloquent interlocutors, they dismissed it as a view only held by a small minority of welleducated and Western-inclined youth who had adopted ideas unsuitable for unique Tibetan circumstances. Karma Choephel, who at the time of our talk in 2007 was the speaker of parliament, had noticed the secular tendency among young Tibetans, but he hoped that their exposure to the world could evolve into a new kind of relation to religion based upon reason while concurrently valuing the benefits of religion. In 1991 he had advocated a Weberian translation of secularism (as related earlier in this chapter), but in 2007 he

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highlighted objectivity over blind faith, which reminds us of Taylor’s writing on secularism.76 Taylor has argued that some form of secularism is unavoidable in modern democratic polities, and that it is not religious faith which motivates a citizen’s participation in a modern democracy. Karma Choephel said: Young people . . . they may seem very modernised and all that, but if you probe deeper, because of the influence of their parents or the society, religion is still very, very deep in their heart. So the change will be very gradual. Anyway, what I hope is that this change should be for a very objective look at religion. Not blind faith in religion, but very objective, very reasoned and considered opinion about religion. Religion is very important. Especially Buddhism is a religion which really can help many people. It helps me also. So the young people should have that sort of proper perspective. They may not spend most of their time doing religious practice or praying or going to the monastery, etc., but they should know the value of our religion.77 Taylor has described that in modernisation processes religion becomes rationalised with a focus on the personalised approach to religion rather than to a higher power outside of oneself.78 He explained the link between secularism and democracy as inextricable in that citizens in a modern democratic polity end up subscribing to an overall political ethic that connects all citizens in a common solidarity that is independent of their manifold religious belief. Many Tibetan interlocutors believed that education and exposure to the world eventually could lead to a secularisation of the Tibetan polity, but trusted that their fellow exiles – modern or not – would not abandon religion altogether.

Separating skin from flesh Nyima, a so-called ‘new-arrival’ (gsar ’byor) and student from Lhasa, explained to me that the paradigm of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ’brel) represents ‘tradition’, while democracy is

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‘modern.’ He thought that because ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ was an ancient system established in Tibet over centuries, it would per se not be possible to disintegrate it and separate religion from Tibetan polity today. As Nyima Tashi explained, the Tibetan majority cannot envision srid without chos, since ‘people think it is like skin and flesh [sha dang phag pa]’.79 While there is an agreement that chos played a major role in pre1951 Tibetan politics and governance, there is no agreement whether chos, interpreted as religion or Buddhism, should play a role in the present exile situation. Exile and democratic reforms have accelerated the problematisation of the previously natural-looking categories of what constitutes chos, what constitutes srid, and a discussion of whether Tibetans should deal with the Dalai Lama’s gift of democracy as a secular entity. This separation between the domains of the secular and the religious is only activated by some Tibetans, who usually invoke a normative discourse on secularism which is well known in the West. We can read into Tibetans’ statements not only Weber, but also Asad and Taylor.80 For other Tibetans, such a separation is unthinkable. Moreover, many define the political space through chos, since, as numerable observers also note, chos pervades all aspects of Tibetan society and is the main source for a pan-Tibetan identity. How, then, can the Tibetan model of democracy be without chos? Even the Dalai Lama’s suggestion in 1991 that a secularism which included chos on an equal basis with politics shook up the parliamentarians who felt their Tibetan identity was threatened and a link to the past severed. My research has shown that many Tibetans relate to the concepts ‘secular’ and ‘secularism’ by translating, interpreting and selectively adopting them in various ways. Thus, there is no uniform or unequivocal attempt to replicate or parrot Western, secular democracy – whatever that might entail. Instead, the conceptual realm of ‘secular’ and the relation between Buddhism and democracy have been interpreted differently. We must therefore speak of secularisms in the plural.81 These secularisms not only translate connotations of ‘secular’ differently (i.e. from the English term into several Tibetan terms), but also infuse different meanings into the concepts of these Tibetan terms.

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I distinguish between three categories of different translations and evaluations, which must be treated as competing imaginations of Tibetan modernity – whether they are arguing for a secularism in the manner that ‘the encompassers’, ‘the displacers’ or ‘the traditionalists’ do.82 One might be prompted to believe that the term I apply, ‘traditionalists’, is a label that I have applied to the elder generation of Tibetans-in-exile due to their conservatism, as opposed to a generation of young, modern-educated entrepreneurs. This is, however, not the case. The discussion on secularism is not a battle between generations. Among the traditionalists, one will find monks, nuns, and lay people of all ages, most of whom are not modern-educated. What they have in common is that they defend the paradigm of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ symbolised by their religious and national leader, the Dalai Lama, and advocate for a continuation of an age-old Tibetan institution: the Ganden Phodrang government. In fact, in their opinion, ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ should be protected against a foreign and threatening secularism, whatever this may refer to in the Tibetan language. While the latter may seem somewhat opposed to modernity in their reluctance to change what they perceive as unique to Tibetan polity and politics, the ‘encompassers’ and the ‘displacers’ are alternative Tibetan modernities wrangling to promote their translation of Tibetan democracy. In any of these attempts to demarcate the proper place of chos in relation to governance, democracy is translated and constructed in dissimilar ways. The ‘encompassers’ promote a non-sectarian secularism based upon an Indian model and believe that it is possible to infuse Buddhism (and perhaps also other religiously founded ethics) into a secular democracy. The ‘displacers’ lean towards a Weberian interpretation of secularism and wish to disenchant democracy by moving religion out of the political sphere. Thus, although going into exile might be collectively imagined by Tibetan refugees as the ‘modern moment’, it is clear that how they experience and imagine modernity varies. Therefore, we cannot look for and we will not find any one or singular Tibetan modernity that can be studied regarding the degree to which Tibetan culture has been synchronised along some fixed parameter

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with secular democracy at the better end of the scale. Neither can Tibetan modernity be simply reduced to cases of either resisting or embracing a universal modernity, nor as a vernacularised version of a Western prototype. Instead, the many understandings of secularisms presented above shows us that there indeed are multiple influences which impact processes of modernisation. The Tibetan translations of secularism have evolved from within traditional Tibetan ideology and culture; they have related to Euro-American and Indian cultural influences; and they have defined its difference in relation to the fundamentalist secularism of the Chinese state. Hence, Tibetan translations are mixing influences of secularism as we see elsewhere in Asia.83 The Tibetan model for democracy that developed in exile since 1959 along ideals of modern liberal democracy has incorporated the traditional doctrine of ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ (chos srid zung ’brel) into its polity. We can therefore argue that this union of ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’ conceptualisations of democracy and styles of governing challenge the idea that democratisation is synonymous with a secularisation in which religion and politics or church and state should be separated. In the words of 25-year-old Nyima Tashi from Lhasa, the unyoking of chos and srid would be like trying to separate a person’s skin and flesh.

CHAPTER 5 `

I DON'T LIKE POLITICS, BUT I LOVE MY COUNTRY'

When Norzin Yudon, a 31-year-old mother and housewife in Bylakuppe, excused her non-participation in the latest exile-Tibetan election by saying, ‘I don’t like politics, but I love my country’, she expressed a feeling which was commonly found among Tibetans in the settlements.1 Like Norzin Yudon, they knew their ‘democratic rights and duties’, and that they were expected to participate in democracy, in the very least through voting during elections. The problem, however, was that Norzin Yudon did not have the slightest interest in politics. She was quick to emphasise, though, that she loved Tibet. Norzin Yudon attended rallies and served her community, and she considered herself patriotic. When it came to voting, however, she failed to turn up at the ballots. She explained that, ‘If Dharamsala knew that I didn’t vote, they wouldn’t like that I don’t take my right.’ Her husband had told her repeatedly that she should claim her rights, but her answer was always: ‘I don’t want to.’ Norzin Yudon was right. The political elite in Dharamsala would have liked her to vote, and they generally aim to increase voter turnout at national and local elections. In fact, elections have been placed at the very heart of democracy in the Tibetan exile in India. This has become obvious not only from the various translations of democracy, but also from how extensively elections have been applied. Tibetans in India have elected their prime minister,

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members of parliament, local administrators, local assemblies, village leaders, neighbourhood representatives, monitors and tax officers, and they have elected people to the leadership of organisations, boards, cooperative societies, work collectives, market associations and mutual-aid societies. Furthermore, they have performed the ritual of election with formality and a close attention to detail and care. As witnessed by Butler, democratic election has become ‘the hallmark of a community which is extremely self-conscious about its democratic processes’.2 In her observations of elections to the Tibetan Women’s Association, she remarked that ‘an NGO election is not simply a matter of exercising one’s individual rights, but of demonstrating the community’s commitment to democracy for the benefit of an external audience’. The external audience, who will be pleased to hear about how extensively elections have been applied in the Tibetan settlements in India, includes not only pro-democracy promoters who financially support such movements, but also potential supportive governments. Shain has explained how the international practice of government recognition, i.e. ‘the acts of granting, withholding, or withdrawing recognition from governments’, is linked to a regime’s political character since legal, democratic principles are the main guideline for recognition policies.3 That is to say, recognition is granted to governments that have emerged from free elections. This means that contenders to state power (also exiled ones) who are democratically elected can be recognised as the legitimate rulers and representatives of a people, although they do not control the state machinery.4 In view of the international state recognition practices based on democratic legality, it is no wonder that governments launch democratic reforms and claim to be undergoing a process of democratisation and covet the image of being a democracy. In other words, election has a central position internationally in legitimising power. My research, furthermore, also displays this self-consciousness and attention to the procedural aspects of democracy amongst Tibetans, but as I show in this chapter, elections have not always been a showcase to please potential supporters of the Tibetan freedom struggle and building of democracy. Instead, elections have taken

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place to meet the expectations of Tibetans themselves. By performing minutely correct elections like rituals that empower and confirm the leadership’s authority, they have demonstrated their commitment to democracy while securing the legitimacy of its leaders. Hence, when Tibetans hold elections, they empower the representatives elected on the one hand, but also prove their democratic intent on the other hand. If we should follow Dalton, Shin and Jou’s study on democracy’s triumph in ‘unlikely places’, a focus on election proves to be a somewhat less mature understanding of what democracy entails.5 They have argued that people with little experience of democracy, i.e. who are less mature, tend to define democracy in terms of its input – i.e. its procedural aspects usually understood to be free and fair elections. However, it is not only inexperienced citizens of new democracies who give special importance to election in their understanding of democracy; democratic elections are also revered among scholars and international democracy promoters not only as ‘engines’ of democratisation, but also as proof of democracy.6 These international actors regard elections as the best procedure to make decisions, to choose representatives and to ensure government accountability. There can be no democracy if democratic elections are not held, as expressed in unison among these actors. Nonetheless, democratic election cannot guarantee a high participation rate or any ‘real’ participation, in that people may also participate in democracy in ways which go beyond voting, as we shall see in the context of Tibetan settlements in India. Furthermore, Dalton, Shin and Jou argue that increased experience of democracy enhances people’s understandings of it, but also influences and changes people’s definition of democracy towards output aspects such as freedom and rights.7 This more ‘mature’ understanding of democracy involves a legitimisation of the political system and the policies according to governability, i.e. the capacity to act and realise policies.8 Thus, if we follow Dalton, Shin and Jou’s argumentation and want to locate where the legitimacy of democracy germinates in the minds of Tibetans, we can expect that the Tibetan exiles’ enhanced experience with democracy will shift their focus from its input to its

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output definitions. It also follows that in their translations of democracy, they will come to evaluate their representatives and leaders according to their capability to govern, not according to the processes that have elevated them to elite political positions, such as prime minister, member of parliament, settlement administrator, village leader or neighbourhood representative. Likewise, Tibetans in India have often mentioned that election is central to democracy and that it legitimises leadership positions, but when we look at what they actually do, we notice two trends which diffuse this stated importance of elections: low voter participation rates at national elections and the settlement dwellers’ preference for appointed instead of democratically elected administrators at the local level. Thus, elections in Tibetan settlements in India are enveloped in ambiguity which, I argue, concerns a tension involving leadership authority and democratic legitimacy. The first part of the chapter looks at national-level elections and maps the reasons that Tibetans’ give for the seemingly low voter turnout. This is followed by an investigation into local elections, in which settlement dwellers indeed alternate between legitimisation through Dharamsala appointment and through democratic elections. I argue that this shows an ambiguity regarding authority that has partly to do with lack of trust in the abilities of oneself and fellow exiles, and that Tibetans see Dharamsala representatives as more qualified and educated, sometimes even possessing some of the Dalai Lama’s enchantment. This, I claim, enhances the gap between the political headquarters in Dharamsala and, on the one hand, its promotion of an ideal, model Tibetan citizen and, on the other hand, the actual situation in the settlements where the citizens live and practise democracy (cf. Chapter 2). These dynamics have also impacted the manner in which Tibetans have not actively sought political responsibilities themselves, and only reluctantly accepted them when elected. Here we see how Norzin Yudon’s statement, ‘I don’t like politics, but I love my country’, is relevant in another crucial way: accepting political office not because of a desire to gain personal power, but merely out of a sense of duty to the Dalai Lama and an expressed love for Tibet which has been positioned as a palpable

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virtue in Tibetan political culture. These political dynamics have often been connected to a norm of anti-competitiveness (as related in Chapter 3), which has meant that election campaigns have been virtually absent – until now. That is also the topic of the latter part of this chapter, which discusses the 2011 elections of the Tibetan primeminister-in-exile, which according to Tibetan political commentators, has signalled a change in the ways in which people relate to leadership and democracy.

Electing Dharamsala representatives When Tibetans in India celebrate ‘democracy day’ (mang gtso’i dus chen) on 2 September, it is to commemorate the first election that took place in exile. The election of a Tibetan parliament-in-exile in the summer of 1960 represents the birth of democracy in an exileTibetan context. Previously, there was no universal suffrage and no pan-Tibetan election to the three national assemblies that the traditional Tibetan government consulted.9 Today, however, Tibetans elect their prime minister and the 44 seats in the Tibetan parliamentin-exile. However, voter turnout does not seem to meet the exileadministration’s ideal of a participating electorate, although compared to previous elections, the voter turnout was higher at the 2011 elections than in the 2006 elections for members of parliament (MPs) and prime minister (PM). The statistics from the election of MPs to the Tibetan parliament-in-exile reveal that out of the approximately 150,000 Tibetan exiles, a total of 79,449 have registered to vote. In the PM election in 2006, 72,000 Tibetans, or 60 per cent, were registered to vote, but only 32,205 people, an estimated 26.8 per cent of the population, actually voted. Moreover, 58.54 per cent of the registered voters turned up at the ballots and cast their votes in 2011, compared to 52.41 per cent in 2006. Voter turnout for the prime-minister-in-exile elections, thus, increased between the 2006 and 2011 elections, and I shall delve into this at the end of this chapter. The overall turnout for the 2011 elections was 58.97 per cent, at the same level as the elections of MPs, which was a major leap from 44.26 per cent in the 2006 election. The electorate

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was divided into two exile constituencies that together define the Tibetan population: the clergy who are registered into five different religious groups and the laity who are registered into three regional groups.10 Taking a closer look at the numbers from the 2011 elections, we see that the electorate consists of 83,399 registered eligible voters divided according to their registered religious and regional affiliation.11 Except for the Kagyu and Bon electorate, religious institutions consisting of monks and nuns at the various monasteries and nunneries throughout South Asia had a higher voter participation rate compared to the lay electorate (see Table 5.1). The level of voter turnout in 2006 had amounted to, in the words of Tibetan intellectual Jamyang Norbu ‘voter apathy’,12 but compared to the latest elections elsewhere in the world, Tibetan exiles should perhaps not be that discouraged: the latest parliamentary election in India (2014) drew a 66.40 per cent voter turnout, and comparatively, 87.74 per cent in Denmark (2011), 65.77 per cent in the United Kingdom (2010), and 67.95 per cent in the United States (2010).13 Looking at the reasons that Tibetans have given for what they consider to have been a low voter turnout, we see

Table 5.1

Voters according to affiliation at the 2011 elections

Religious traditions

Registered

Turnout number

Turnout percentage

Nyingma Sakya Kagyu Geluk Bon

1,898 799 1,044 7,832 300

1,337 519 512 6,024 110

70.44 64.96 49.64 76.92 36.67

Regions

Registered

Turnout number

Turnout percentage

4,456 22,196 45,841

2,759 13,571 24,507

61.92 61.14 53.46

Domed/Amdo Dotoe/Kham Utsang

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that they challenge the voting system’s parameters for authenticity. Furthermore, their answers problematise spatiality, in that Tibet as a geographical and political entity is stretched out, and that the Tibetans who do not vote find it difficult to commit to the democratic ideals emanating from the political centre and their representatives, as will be related in the following. The most common explanation that was given for not voting in the elections was that since Tibetans are often participating in a travelling community, this has meant that many people were away on business or attending college on Election Day. This may seem like an insufficient excuse for not voting, since the Election Commission,14 business cooperatives and student organisations have provided voting opportunities outside of the settlements. Equipped with a voter registration number and a ‘green book’ that proves their tax payments to the Tibetan Freedom Movement, they were able to vote out of station, but few chose to do so. On the other hand, community leaders in Tibetan settlements have been proud to say that they had 100 per cent voter participation. In general, however, the elder generation, who form the majority staying in settlements, had felt obliged to participate. Samten Chodon, born and raised in India, educated in the United States and now the director of a Dharamsala organisation, corroborated my observation during our talk in 2012: ‘First of all they feel like it’s their responsibility, and it is something that they see as a gift from His Holiness . . . And then secondly, it has a lot to do with the identity of where you come from.’15 It was thus a strong sense of duty and regional identity that drew the older generation of Tibetans exiles to the polls, while the young neither had the same sense of duty nor regional identity committing them to democracy. Karma Yeshi, the 37-year-old MP and former TYC leader, explained in our conversation in 2007: I sometimes blame the youngsters. They say: ‘Oh, we need changes.’ But to bring changes they must participate, and then 80 per cent of the youngsters don’t take part in elections, vote . . . If you understand democracy, you must practise democracy properly. For that you must take initiative . . . For

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that, education needs to be given to the youngsters especially. Otherwise, all these elderly people, they don’t know. They do it out of duty: ‘Oh we have to go [to vote], His Holiness said.’ Otherwise, they have no vision. They don’t understand democracy, but they are the people who take part. If you look at settlements: almost 80 per cent [participation]. The problem is Dharamsala, Delhi, Chandigarh, the big cities.16 It is to the cities that the settlements have lost their youth. Karma Yeshi conferred with the Election Commission which has identified college students in Indian cities as the group which has pulled down the voter participation rates in the statistics. He estimated that only seven students out of around 50 in Chandigarh have casted their vote in the 2006 election. The numbers provided by the Election Commissioner Jampal Chosang for the elections in 2011, similarly showed how only 35 Tibetans went to the polls out of 110 registered voters. In Table 5.2, I compare four settlements with permanent elections offices, including Chandigarh which had a provisional election office set up by the Election Commission for the occasion. Another reason given for the low voter turnout referred to the voting system which seemed to be too complicated, thus discouraging the youth from voting, as also mentioned by MP Karma Yeshi. Before Tibetans could vote, they had to pay their tax duties, and they had to prove it by carrying their green book when they registered to vote. Students usually do not carry their green Table 5.2

Voter turnout in selected settlements 2011 Turnout Registered Turnout number percentage

Dharamsala Lugsam (Bylakuppe) Dekyi Larsoe (Bylakuppe) Munghod Chandigarh

11,675 6,519 1,848 6,823 110

6,338 4,616 1,270 5,080 35

55.77 71.60 70.75 75.55 31.81

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books with them, but keep it with their families because their families are the ones who make sure the taxes are paid. Therefore, many of young Tibetan exiles failed to register to vote. Furthermore, Trinle Chodon, a 23-year-old writer and university student in Delhi, added another explanation for the low voter participation. In his opinion, his peers were just like any other youth; they were lazy and had no interest in national politics: ‘In general young people don’t care about voting . . . It’s just like: They don’t vote! Just like any other country! You know?’17 Other critical voices among Tibetans blame the parliament set-up and complex election procedure for discouraging voter participation. The quota system that the Tibetan parliament-in-exile has adopted has meant that seats in the parliament were allocated to delegates according to their regional origin and religious adherence as described in the charter.18 Members of parliament were democratically elected by Tibetan exiles above the age of 18 who held a valid green book. Also, the electorate was divided according to regions and religions as described in the election rules.19 In elections for parliament, a lay person could vote for ten regional candidates, and she could only vote for those belonging to the same region as her. A person whose parents originated from different regions could choose which region they officially belonged to. It was possible to change one’s regional affiliation upon marriage, when one could adopt the region of one’s spouse (article 46.1).20 Interestingly, Tibetans outside South Asia were supposed to disregard religious and regional loyalties, and instead vote for members who were responsible for their constituencies by electing two North American and two European representatives. Monks and nuns, moreover, had dual franchise rights: one vote for their ten regional candidates and another for their two religious candidates. Since lay Tibetans had ten votes, but monks and nuns had ten plus two votes, several informants – especially second and third generation exiles – thought it contradicted the ideal of ‘one man, one vote’. They believed dual franchise rights was an anti-democratic feature of the system that discouraged voting, and argued that clergy and laity should have equal rights. This could be achieved either by

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abolishing the system altogether, or by extending the dual franchise rights to lay Tibetans who were also devout Buddhists and should therefore have the same right to vote for religious representatives. A few individuals within the CTA have also admitted to me that it was a mistake to give the clergy dual franchise rights when the charter was written in 1991. The election itself had two stages. In the preliminary round, the electorate nominated candidates. A Tibetan exile above 18 years old holding a valid green book could nominate any Tibetan exile above the age of 25 from his or her region or religious tradition. For these candidates, the Election Commission shortlisted 20 candidates for each of the three provinces, four for Europe, four for North America and four for each of the religious traditions. The Election Commission then published their ‘bio-data’ well in advance of election. If we look at these short biographies, we can

Figure 5.1 Members of parliament, consisting of both laity and clergy, having a tea-break outside the old building of the Tibetan parliament-inexile, March 2007.

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gain a slight indication of what was considered to be important. What did they say in these biographies to collect votes? What was highlighted as enhanced qualifications for constituting a good MP? And what agendas were they promoting? Later in this chapter we see how Tibetans in the settlements valued a leader who was educated, had political talent and resisted corruption, but when it came to members of parliament, however, it was neither clear what qualification they had nor what issues they intended to raise in the parliament if they were elected. These candidates represented no political parties and they had no political programmes, but presented in their biographies their educational and professional background, community service, civil society work, family relations and previous political offices (also of their family members). Also, the candidate’s participation in political campaigns, demonstrations and hunger strikes, and other sacrifices in the name of the Tibetan freedom struggle, even spending time in Tihar jail, were highlighted in the biographies.21 These biographies and the shortlist of candidates were sent to settlements, monasteries and scattered communities, and they were published in the government’s official magazine Shes bya. From the biographies, the electorate could inform itself about the nominated candidates from the relevant province or religious tradition who managed to pass through the first round. Apart from the official biographies, the regional unions, the National Democratic Party of Tibet and the Youth for Better MPs also published their own lists of candidates whom they supported. In the second and final round of preliminaries, the electorate chose the candidates from the shortlist finalised by the Election Commission. Since elections were neither party- nor issue-based but depended upon the information presented in the biographies, selecting ten or 12 candidates (if you also vote for candidates to the religious seats) for the members of parliament-in-exile could be difficult, as it was based on familiarity with the names which drew the most votes. Several Tibetans told me that it could be very daunting to vote since they had to come up with so many names in the preliminaries. Pema Thinley, the editor of Tibetan Review, remarked:

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You have to vote for ten candidates! You hardly know even three or four! And in the case of illiterate [voters], when there is someone literate to write for them, they just ask the person who is writing: ‘Whatever you feel is good, you tick that.’22 Many Tibetans did not know the candidates beforehand, and in many cases, this served as an excuse not to vote. Since Tibetan political culture denounces self-promotion, election campaigns have been unusual – at least until 2011. One young man, Tsultrim Dorje, actually did campaign for his own candidacy. When he stood for election as the MP candidate of a home-district organisation in the preliminaries in 2005, he even had a slogan that he hoped would get him elected: He wanted to be the ‘voice for the voiceless’, because ‘those are real citizens of Tibet’.23 Tsultrim Dorje printed 2,500 copies of his poster and travelled to South India on his campaign trail. The campaign left him with many leftover posters in the cabinet of his office in Dharamsala, but no seat in the parliament. He did not obtain enough votes in the final round, but he tried to hide his disappointment by saying that he did not want to be an MP in exile anyway. However, when he returned to Tibet one day, he would want to stand for election again: The day that I go to my country, I want to become an MP of my country – the free country. It cannot be a proud feeling for me if I become a member of parliament-in-exile . . . I want to be a member of parliament for free Tibet . . . So, for that to happen I need to do something for my country. My country should be free. So right now, my priority is to do something for the independence movement . . . When we have a free country, when we go back to our country, yes, then I want to fight for election. I want to become a member of parliament if I get the opportunity.24 During our hour-long talk in 2006, Tsultrim Dorje emphasised that it was his love for Tibet and his patriotism which motivated him. He disclaimed any interest in becoming a person of power, and

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implied that one is looked down upon if they give the impression that they actually want to become a member of parliament. Perhaps his self-promotion disqualified him or worked against him, since modesty is often seen as an indigenous Tibetan virtue. An effect of this norm of anti-competitiveness has been that the electorate has been unfamiliar with most office seekers, and they have been left with fewer options to make knowledgeable decisions on whom to vote for. Some Tibetans have criticised the system, saying that they did not vote because they did not know any candidates. An element of this criticism has also to do with the ideal held by many Tibetans that democracy entails freedom of choice. Since the parliament template has given limited freedom of choice in MP elections, some have protested this by not participating. For instance, Trinle Chodon believed that the religion – region template discouraged the young from participating because this restriction was tied to communal constructs that basically went against the panTibetan identity upon which citizenship and suffrage should rest.25 The template fixed Tibetan identities into communal categories, but the choice of MPs to a parliament should be issue-based, not based on regionalism and sectarianism. Pema Sangmo, a 37-year-old local RTWA leader and civil servant in Bylakuppe, seconded this focus on the freedom of choice in the sense of having the freedom to elect whomever one wants, but in her view, the set-up for MP elections did not exemplify a freedom of choice.26 This was because Pema Sangmo was not allowed to vote for the candidate that she herself believed was the best candidate, but she was restricted within the religion–region template. Thus, ‘the members of parliament election was not much democracy’, she concluded. However, according to Pema Sangmo, democracy has been established in other ways at the local level: local leaders have been elected, such as the co-op board members, as well as middlemen such as the camp leaders: ‘Those elections are free and we can vote for anybody.’ Disregarding the fact that freedom of choice has always been restricted in democracies, her expectations towards democracy were not realised in the present Tibetan system, because in her view, authenticity was not necessarily determined by the candidate’s Buddhist practice or proximity to Lhasa or Dharamsala,

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but should be replaced by issue-based politics free of regional and sectarian friction.27

Legitimising authority in the settlements However, unsatisfactory voter turnout – regardless of how it is explained – does not contradict my claim that presently the dominant translation of democracy defines democracy in terms of input. On the contrary, since elections are often understood to be the machines that make democracy work, then naturally Dharamsala leadership would wish for an increasing number of Tibetans to turn up at the ballots. Nonetheless, I argue, the elections to important middlemen positions in the settlements – the elections which link the families in the settlements to a chain of communication that ideally goes all the way to Dharamsala – have blurred the Dharamsala ideal of a participatory democracy. A closer look at local elections reveals tensions revolving around leadership, authority and democratic legitimacy, and for our purpose here, two middlemen posts are examined: the uppermost position of the settlement administrator and the lowest middleman position of the camp leader (cf. Chapter 2). It is striking that most Tibetan settlements in India have rejected their right to elect someone from within their settlement to the post of administrator. On the other hand, they commonly invoke the democracy discourse in order to legitimate camp leader authority. Thus, a somewhat fuzzy picture emerges from inquiries into how Tibetans have legitimised authority since they, as I will show in the following, have alternated between various registers. It is not my intention to judge the degree of commitment to democratic values based on this apparent ambiguity, but rather to disentangle the various facets and levels of political processes. I argue that the ambiguity regarding democratic elections has partly to do with a lack of trust in one’s own competences and those of fellow exiles. Furthermore, it also has to do with the status that Dharamsala has acquired among Tibetans, and how Tibetans have viewed Dharamsala representatives as qualified and educated, even as possessing some of the Dalai Lama’s authority because they have his blessing.

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Out of India’s 39 settlements for Tibetans, only four settlements have democratically elected their administrator: Bir Derge, Dharamsala, Ladakh and Solan Bon Settlement.28 There are many arguments as to why the administrator should be democratically elected from the settlement itself, but few among my informants mentioned any. The only argument that I have heard is that an administrator sent from Dharamsala does not know the problems and circumstances of the settlement, and when he finally understands, he will be transferred to another settlement where he faces the same newcomer problems of unfamiliarity again. Administrators are usually transferred to a new post at another place after three years in the settlement, creating a chain reaction of staff reshuffling throughout the settlements in India. Thus, the argument goes, the work never gets accomplished in the settlements. An administrator from the settlement itself, on the other hand, knows the settlement so he will take care of problems. So, why do they not want to democratically elect one? Several Dharamsala-based agents have made efforts to encourage settlements to elect their own administrators. The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD), for example, arranged a public talk in Bylakuppe while I was there in February 2007, with speakers from Dharamsala addressing how Tibetans should use their democratic rights. The TCHRD had received this project from the CTA’s Social and Resource Development Fund in Dharamsala, and it had as its second objective to encourage and survey whether the inhabitants of Bylakuppe wanted a local assembly. It also held a threeday workshop for local leaders, monastery representatives, as well as delegates from the Tibetan Women’s Association, the Tibetan Youth Congress and the Tibetan Freedom Movement association. According to the TCHRD’s estimate, around 1,000 people turned up at the public talk, and 50 people participated in the workshop. Researchers from the TCHRD also visited camps and villages, surveying whether the inhabitants preferred an administrator elected within their settlement or one appointed from Dharamsala. I was present in Village 11 when the TCHRD arrived with its survey in February 2007. ‘Some officials from Dharamsala have arrived’, the village leader told me,

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‘they have come to talk to us about human rights’. Another villager thought the visitors were people from Dharamsala who wanted to talk about democracy. None of them knew why the TCHRD was there, but since they came from Dharamsala, the inhabitants of Village 11 turned up at the meeting as they had been told. The TCHRD told them that elections were important and they were in accordance with the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile, instilling a sense of duty among the villagers to act according to rules. Some Tibetans felt, however, that such speeches lacked proper explanations for the reasons that democratic elections should be held, and argued that ordinary people in the settlements remained ‘uninformed about democracy’. The report produced by the TCHRD based upon their survey in Village 11 and elsewhere corroborated my own findings. Bylakuppe residents wanted their administrator to be appointed by the CTA, because if it sends one from Dharamsala then the people will trust him – whoever is appointed.29 Samten Chodon, a 36-year-old leader of a Dharamsala research institute, belonged to the Solan Bon Settlement in Himachal Pradesh. When we met in 2012, she thought that the reason why her settlement had been able to agree upon a democratically administrator, as well as established a local assembly, was because, as a religious minority (Bonpos) having their own settlement, the inhabitants did not fear misrepresentation. This settlement, according to Samten Chodon, was more homogeneous than other settlements, and therefore less strife-ridden. However, she told me how she had noticed that over the years the settlement has become more inclined towards having an administrator sent from Dharamsala. Their settlement was so small, she explained, and like other settlements, it was emptied of the educated Tibetans who preferred central Dharamsala to the peripheral settlements.30 Therefore, she thought that the inhabitants of her settlement felt compelled to gain a representative from Dharamsala, so that they would be guaranteed to have someone with knowledge and experience in the position to administer the settlement. In her own words: Educated young Tibetans are leaving their own settlements in search of better jobs. So who is left behind? The older people

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and the kids, and, you know, some of those less-educated ones. So now your choice is among those, and sometimes what happens is that the one who is popularly elected turns out to be a school dropout. That really happened in our settlement.31 If the settlement chose to refuse electing a representative from among the inhabitants, then Dharamsala would send someone who had an academic degree, who passed the administration entrance test, and who had some experience. Moreover, Dharamsala would send someone from the CTA, who had, in the words of Samten Chodon: ‘the blessing of His Holiness’. Other explanations that I repeatedly came across were that an administrator appointed from the outside could prevent nepotism, rivalries and ensure that the administrator had the people’s respect. Tsering Namgyal, a 64-year-old farmer and village leader in Dickey Larsoe, summed it up succinctly: So, the majority voted that it is best if the local representative of the government is from Dharamsala and not from here. I think that if a poor fellow emerges [as the representative], if someone from the settlement acts [as the representative], they won’t respect him, since they know him personally. So the majority voted in favour of a representative sent from Dharamsala.32 Furthermore, leadership positions filled by personnel appointed by the CTA were viewed by many settlement dwellers as the extended arm of the Dalai Lama, because ‘His Holiness is the government.’ Such administrators generally enjoyed widespread respect among the public, no matter what age and background the administrator had, and would make the people ‘do as they are told’, another man informed me. Thus, they avoided questioning the legitimacy of the administrator: ‘If someone is appointed from there [Dharamsala], he comes with authority which ultimately goes all the way to the Dalai Lama’, Pema Thinley, the editor of Tibetan Review, concluded in one of our talks. He explained how political participation, in his opinion, was impeded by the sacredness that Dharamsala emitted:

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When Tibetans think and talk about the government, they think of it in terms of something very sacred, not something which is theirs to influence and change. That traditional sense is there. The sense of respect for the government in a sacred sort of sense, rather than in a political participatory sense, you know. That attitude is there, very strongly.33 Presumably the authority of the Dalai Lama has rubbed off on CTA officials, since the CTA was created by him. Few Tibetans would point to the government as something created by, or belonging to, the people. Since the Dalai Lama had given Tibetans a democratic government, it was the people’s duty to do as the CTA dictated. Gelek Gyatso, a 53-year-old farmer in Bylakuppe and a long-time member of RTYC, explained the Tibetans’ trust in the government: So basically, this government of ours is based on the vision of His Holiness from 1959, and everybody who eats roasted barley [i.e. all Tibetans] recognises it. Now, there can’t be anyone who doesn’t come under this Tibetan government. Whatever command the government gives, we will follow it. This is our government, and everybody has this respect for it. Respecting it is a duty . . . The trust is total, 100 per cent. We trust him. We trust our government. The government considers us as its subjects as well, and the Tibetan public believes in the government-in-exile, and they never disobey it. Everyone respects the government.34 It is obvious from Gelek Gyatso’s statement that the authority that the CTA enjoys has been derived from its link to the Dalai Lama, but the CTA has never enjoyed unconditional authority among all Tibetans living in exile. It is not everybody who is as devoted as Gelek Gyatso. The legitimacy of Dharamsala has been questioned by Tibetans whose voices, in many cases, have been effectively silenced by the censorship that some Tibetans have taken upon themselves to execute in the name of the Dalai Lama, and on behalf of the strongly felt need for unity (more details in Chapter 6). In these cases, having

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an authoritative administration in the settlement can more effectively quell tensions and ensure unity, at least on the surface. The CTA’s legitimacy may also be challenged now that the Dalai Lama in 2011 has severed the link between his Ganden Phodrang institution and the CTA. However, if we turn this upside down, we might also witness increased legitimacy of this exile administration, because it cannot hide behind the icon of the Dalai Lama and might be judged according to new standards – i.e. not loyalty to the Dalai Lama or election rituals, but political performance and representativity, i.e. output. While a government officer sent from Dharamsala is similar to, what the former administrator in Sonnada Settlement Lobsang Norbu called, ‘a mandate from Heaven’,35 an administrator elected from the settlement itself would not enjoy the same respect and trust. Many people believed that it would be difficult to find someone qualified among the settlement dwellers. Tsering Namgyal, the 64year-old leader of Village 3 in Dickey Larsoe, explained that Tibetans doubt that there is someone eligible in their own community, that is to say someone who is educated enough, who does not ‘favour his own people’ and who enjoys and deserves trust and respect among his neighbours.36 Therefore, it is inconceivable to elect someone from within the settlement to a position as the direct link to Dharamsala and as a representative of the Dalai Lama and the government. We see here not only a delineation of who is qualified to hold this important position, i.e. an educated, incorrupt and politically talented Tibetan, but we also sense the importance of spatiality. Proximity to Dharamsala, and therefore also the Dalai Lama, has been an important feature in defining levels of authority, and we can also see how authority has been placed on a ‘scale of proximity’ to enchanted Dharamsala. The refusal to elect settlement administrators, according to Lobsang Norbu, was an example of how the respect that the Tibetans have for authorities has in fact obstructed the democratisation process.37 This view was shared by several of the leaders whom I interviewed from the CTA, NGOs and settlements, but these leaders never acknowledged the scepticism that settlement residents have

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had towards their own candidates, and never did they view this distrust as healthy for democracy or as a mature, pragmatic aspect of local democracy in the settlements. The ideal situation that the CTA in Dharamsala has envisioned is that the Tibetan settlements become involved in the democratic process of election, and thereby prove their ‘democratic-ness’ instead of merely accepting appointed representatives. Lobsang Norbu expressed how he felt that people have to ‘sacrifice their wishes’ in order to make a ‘healthy democratic system’; hence, this has entailed a sacrifice for them and would take time to implement, but he was convinced that eventually democracy would seep into the Tibetan communities.38 Bylakuppe’s two pioneer settlements in relation to initiating democratisation have so far evaded the right to elect an administrator from among their neighbours. This has not been the case, however, when they selected local leaders. On the contrary, at the village- and camp level, Tibetans have utilised the democracy discourse in order to reject non-elected local leaders. This has meant that a justification for gaining authority has not been as clear-cut as normally assumed: sometimes legitimate authority has been recognised in a post because it was filled in a democratic fashion, and at other times recognised in a post that was filled by appointment. These attitudes towards elected versus appointed leadership positions become clearer, however, when we consider a spatial aspect and the proximity to Dharamsala. In general, there is greater authority given to persons who have a closer link to Dharamsala and the Dalai Lama, which in turn is disproportionate to the desired level of democracy. Administrators and camp leaders act as middlemen, managers, decision-makers and even judges. An illustration of the importance that they hold in these positions is when they manage the day-to-day problems in the settlement, and it is their responsibility to mediate, admonish and punish in family disputes, neighbour conflicts, and so forth.39 Lobsang Norbu had experienced this when he acted as an administrator in Sonnada. He told me that Tibetans would approach the leaders of their community to solve matters and decide punishments, because they were the ones who enjoyed the most respect among the Tibetans. Because the settlement where he

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was an administrator was small, settlement dwellers did not use middlemen like camp leaders, but approached him directly with their problems: Sometimes, even small, small things like the quarrels in the home or family disputes, they come to your house. But, OK, there is one good tendency in the Tibetan people: that they listen to you. The nature of the people is that they want some decisions. They want a decision from somebody in authority – high authorities. When you give them a decision after looking into the matter, then they accept it because you are the administrator. Because they have in their mind that you are a representative of His Holiness, you are a representative of the exile government. So that shows that they respect the government, they respect our bka’ shag [cabinet] and everything.40 The respect that Lobsang Norbu experienced as an appointed administrator has not always been given for the democratically elected settlement leaders. Both positions are important, since these leaders have the authority to act as judges and give orders to the settlement inhabitants. It is here, on the issue of legitimating authority, that the picture becomes hazy. As a rule, camp leaders should be democratically elected, but it often happens that the elected leader has passed his duties on to a family member or a neighbour (as we saw in Chapters 2 and 3). A camp leader who has inherited his post in this fashion can face a lot of resistance from the people and even be deemed incompetent. Such a leader, who has replaced the elected leader, may be met with arguments borrowed from the democracy discourse when he tries to mobilise his constituency: ‘We did not vote for you, so who are you to tell us what to do?!’ The first time 64-year-old farmer Tsering Namgyal acted as the village leader, it was on behalf of the democratically elected leader, his neighbour, who was away on business and had left Tsering Namgyal with the responsibility. Because Tsering Namgyal was not democratically elected, he could not order people to do things. The villagers would reply that, since they never elected him, they did not

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want to listen to him. Therefore, whenever work had to be done, he had to ask them to ‘please help’. He could not simply order them around, because no election had empowered him. When we met in 2007, however, he had finally been democratically elected to the post, so the villagers listened to him. Tsering Namgyal explained: If I am chosen, I act as camp leader for one year only. If the people didn’t vote for me, but I have to work for them [as unelected leader], I cannot scold them, and they won’t listen to me. So, there are all these responsibilities for the camp leader. We have to do whatever work he orders us to do. The camp leader himself has the power to plan and delegate work. The people will give him their full attention, 100 per cent. But if he’s not an [elected] camp leader, and he orders us to work, then we don’t follow whatever he says. Though we won’t oppose the work he wants done – his wish for us to work. We’ll just do it half-heartedly, so it doesn’t feel good for the camp leader.41 Thus, camp leaders were authorised to give orders within their jurisdiction, but those who occupied these positions who were not democratically elected themselves did not automatically gain respect from the other inhabitants. The only way to accept such a leader was if the settlement occupants have empowered him or her through the ritual of democratic election. In contrast, when it came to the uppermost positions of power in settlements, ‘ordinary’ Tibetans were often deemed unable to adequately hold these power positions which were a direct link to Dharamsala. The settlement electorate, in this way, has preferred that these positions should be appointed, not elected.

Who shall rule? I argue that the explanation for this apparent ambiguity lies within a combination of, on the one hand, the Tibetan exiles’ distrust of their own and their peers’ abilities to knowledgeably deliberate and rule, and, on the other hand, the belief that only the Dalai Lama and the

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Dharamsala delegates (who have been touched by his power) are able to make decisions that benefit everybody. Several informants understood that ‘ordinary’ Tibetans were not qualified for these political positions at the uppermost level and for being the link to enchanted Dharamsala. This understanding is also very acute, since the imagined political-national entity of Tibet is fragile in exile. Tibetans’ lack of trust in their own abilities to make decisions for the common good is not a phenomenon exclusive to their emerging democracy in India. The question of who the demos – the people of democracy – is, and who can participate in reaching the decisions that affect entire communities has been continually contested since democracy’s birth in ancient Athens until today. One famous critic of democracy was Plato, who thought the idea of a rule by the people was scandalous. He feared the consequences of letting the masses become in charge. In his opinion, the government should be left in the hands of the few who were qualified. Plato illustrated this with a famous metaphor in The Republic.42 He compared democracy to a ship, where the inexperienced crew had taken control of the helm from the captain. In control of the ship, the crew consumed all their supplies in a drunken orgy, and the ship drifted into the rocks. In Plato’s opinion, only skill and expertise can legitimate a good captain, while the masses are better off being governed. This was not an unusual stance against democracy, as Heywood has reminded us, but reflects the pejorative meaning that democracy had well into the nineteenth century.43 Historically, decision-making has been entrusted to the oldest, the wisest, the wealthiest, and to the experts, the aristocrats, the kings and even the physically strongest. Similarly, in modern Tibet before it was incorporated into the People’s Republic of China in 1951, it was the Dalai Lama, an unelected spiritual and political authority who headed the Ganden Phodrang government (or a regent in the interregnum between two Dalai Lamas). The government was an elite government consisting of lay officials (shod skor) recruited from the aristocracy,44 and monk officials (rtse skor) recruited from middle-class and landholding families, though bright monk students could also be selected.45 In contrast, in a democracy, any citizen, without any

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special qualifications or attributes, can run for elective office, and accordingly, Tibetans-in-exile have promoted equality as fundamental to democracy in order to dispose of elite rule.46 Transforming elite rule into a democracy has, of course, not been a frictionless process. In this regard, Frechette has identified democracy and traditional Tibetan ‘enlightened government’ as conflicting ideals, arguing that Tibetan exiles have to come to terms with both.47 While verifying the friction of such opposing ideals, some Tibetan exiles have lamented that the uneducated Tibetans are incapable to rule according to democratic ideals, because they uphold incompatible, traditional values and practices. As an example, they have asserted that a good family name or belonging to the clergy can carry a candidate through democratic elections. Thus, they similarly recognised in exile the old Tibetan idea which views aristocracy and clergy as better equipped to rule than ordinary Tibetans. Ultimately, ‘enlightened government’ by the Dalai Lama is a safe choice for many Tibetans. Sonam Topgyal, a teacher in Mussoorie with an MA degree in political science, explained that overall, the Tibetans left it to the Dalai Lama to make decisions: His Holiness has lots of influence on our people because he is a very good leader, and we should always follow him. But now we have this democratic system, and then we all have to shed this idea that His Holiness is always over us. We have to believe in our abilities as a people, and we have to know how to organise ourselves and how to believe in this democratic system. One of the most important aspects of democracy is that we have to decide things together, collectively, and then make principles. Then everybody has to respect one’s decisions reached through that process, through discussion, debate, deliberation. That is important.48 Traditionalism and ignorance usually receives the blame for why so many Tibetans ultimately would like the Dalai Lama to decide for the common good. It is not a permanent condition, however, and every Tibetan whom I have talked with unanimously agreed that increased

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levels of education will generate a better understanding of democracy from which democratic action and participation will flow naturally. Kesang Tsomo, a 43-year-old mother of four and a RTYC leader in Bylakuppe, spoke about how His Holiness gave the Tibetans democracy, although the public had not asked for it. She explained that at first, ‘the masses weren’t educated, so they had no idea what to ask for’. However, they had faith in the Dalai Lama, and he ‘showed them the path,’ and gradually, Tibetans will understand. She was convinced that an unconditional faith in the Dalai Lama was all the uneducated Tibetans possessed. Because of the Dalai Lama’s generosity, Tibetans were now given education that gave rise to new ideas and changes within the public.49 The majority of the educated youth have left the settlements, so the elder generation and the school dropouts – who are understood to be patriotic but not especially politically informed or engaged – are left behind to exercise local democracy. This has meant that the authority of the CTA in Dharamsala as some invisible and authoritative entity has been sustained. Seventy-two-year-old farmer Lhamo Yangchen’s analysis corroborated my own suspicion: the CTA is the remote and powerful creation of the Dalai Lama and the educated. She explained during one of our conversations that when Tibetans arrived in India, the educated refugees went to Dharamsala where they established a government-in-exile, built democracy and, in this way, fought for the freedom of Tibet. People like herself, the uneducated, contributed to the freedom struggle by building settlements, working hard, paying taxes and educating their children. The educated and politically active Tibetans were drawn to Dharamsala, and for Lhamo Yangchen, like so many other Tibetans living in settlements, Dharamsala had become the seat for the voice of the exiles.50 The CTA has acknowledged the problem of brain drain in the settlements and made this issue a top priority under the last two prime ministers. At the same time, the CTA and various NGOs have been trying to narrow the gap between Dharamsala and the settlements with implementing education on a local level. Sherab Sangpo explained that since lack of knowledge has made people not

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participate in elections, associations such as the TCHRD, which he was working for, made an effort to empower through education the grassroots level of democracy.51 They targeted local leaders who they believed were able to spread the message of democracy to the masses. Not everyone has agreed that these attempts are sufficient, since they are still implemented by the leaders who receive education, while the masses remain ‘unqualified for democracy’, as one Bylakuppe farmer put it.52 As the strongest critique goes: Tibetans are told that democracy is important, but they are never given explanations as to why that is the case; and they are informed of decisions, but they are never given the agendas to discuss. Therefore, a strong hierarchical bureaucratic sense of government has been upheld, in which people see themselves as disconnected from those in power. One debater blamed what he called the ‘Desi Goleb syndrome’ which for centuries had barred Tibetans from getting involved in politics.53 Desi Goleb (Tib: sde srid mgo leb) literally means ‘regent flat head’, and, according to an editorial note in the Tibetan Political Review, implies a reference to Sangye Gyatso, the regent of the Fifth Dalai Lama.54 He was such an able statesman that the citizens in fact did not care to become involved in governance, believing that the regent would take care of everything. Now, before the 2011 elections, the politically aware Tibetans did not let the Desi Goleb take care of business, but sought to take the responsibility themselves. The problem, however, as related before, was that Tibetan exiles were not so willingly active in seeking out these political responsibilities, and only reluctantly accepted them. Being a reluctant ruler – someone who has taken political office not because of a personal quest for politics or power, but out of duty to the Dalai Lama and love for Tibet – is a tangible virtue in Tibetan political culture. This is connected to a norm of anti-competitiveness (related in Chapter 3), which has not only meant that election campaigns have been virtually absent, but also that those who have accepted political office will make public disclaimers: they never sought office in the first place, but they have accepted to hold power because they were appointed by the Dalai Lama or elected by the people. Furthermore, it is telling that a norm of anti-competitiveness not only has meant that those

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who do occupy political offices will make public statements saying that they did not actively seek office, but also that election campaigns have been virtually absent – until recently. What at first sight appears to be an ambiguity regarding elections, in reality confirms my observation that in the dominant translation of democracy, democracy is understood to be a gift from the Dalai Lama, and therefore ‘enchanted’; moreover, this translation of democracy inevitably creates tension between authority and democratic legitimacy. It is as if direct democracy and enchantment is inversely proportional. How is this frictional relationship between democracy and enchantment affected, then, when the Dalai Lama has distanced himself from his political leadership and from his gift of democracy, and the Tibetans have to search for a new political leader?

Pre-election concerns The Dalai Lama had for many years referred to himself as ‘semiretired’ (see Chapter 1), and publicly expressed the necessity of leaving political decision-making to the Tibetan people. In 2008, he again warned the Tibetans, this time in response to protests in central Tibet, and threatened them that he would withdraw from political power if they did not abstain from using violence.55 This warning reminded Tibetan exiles that they would soon have to deal with the issue of political leadership, and the question of ‘who shall rule?’ felt acutely topical. Moreover, Tibetans have increasingly been contemplating the Dalai Lama’s mortality, fearing that when the Dalai Lama dies, the struggle will have no leader who is able to unite them and no international supporters, and that they, as stateless refugees in India, will be kicked out of their host country. Jamyang Norbu once referred to these worries as a ‘fear mantra’.56 The sense of being in a critical and urgent situation has not only to do with the old age of the Dalai Lama, but also the critical juncture that the Tibetan freedom movement seems to be in, namely at a point where the Dalai Lama’s Middle-Way strategy has come to a standstill since his proposal has been bluntly rejected by the Chinese government, and Tibetans are contemplating changes. Hence, the next decade or two,

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Tibetans seem to agree, are critical for the future of the Tibetan struggle. Some Tibetans tried to turn this sense of urgency into the mobilisation of forces, working to secure leadership transference at the first upcoming election which was that of a new prime-ministerin-exile (also called ‘katri’ or ‘kalon tripa’, Tib: bka’ blon khri pa), the executive head of the cabinet-in-exile. Hence, in this election we gain the opportunity to learn what was at stake for those who discussed capable political leadership, and who aimed at improving the quality of democracy in terms of input. The most visible mobilisation initiative germinated from a network of Tibetans who were connected online with the politically engaged leaders in Dharamsala and extended across the globe.57 They arranged preelection activities which had a contagious effect, spreading from online virtual networks to realities on the ground where Tibetans met and discussed the upcoming elections for a political leader that would lead them in an insecure and dangerous time with a semi-retired and ageing Dalai Lama. So, what was the adequate leadership qualities for these Tibetans in a time of exceptional insecurity? As suggested by hopeful interlocutors, and as reflected in circulating post-election discourses, the unprecedented virulent activities ahead of the election revealed a new turn on the path towards democracy. However, as I argue here, they also revealed new problems and confirmed old ones, including: reluctance to discuss political issues, personality-based politics, the conflation of politics into choices between familiar binaries, and the Dalai Lama’s enchantment hovering over the entire process. The search for a new political leader Several controversial changes had been implemented during the ten years under Samdhong Rinpoche’s leadership (2001–11) in such areas as: education policy, privatising government businesses (including stores and restaurants previously owned by the Department of Finance), organic farming schemes in South Indian settlements, and the cutting of ties between Tibetan organisations and the governmentin-exile. Such controversial policies have meant that there were

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Tibetans who longed to get rid of Samdhong Rinpoche, but as the end of his term approached, there were others who expressed concerns that there were no qualified candidates who were willing to take over as prime minister. The parliament had received several letters suggesting an amendment to the charter that would allow the incumbent PM to hold more than two consecutive terms.58 In a public debate in Dharamsala on 21 June 2009, Samdhong Rinpoche opposed the suggestion, stating that it was necessary that the Tibetan people looked for another person, ideally younger, to be the next PM.59 He also thought that it would be undemocratic to amend the charter just to prolong his personal leadership. In the end, only 11 lawmakers out of the 43-member parliament voted in favour of the proposed bill to lift the two-term limit on the post of the prime minister (on 16 September 2010). A new prime minister was unavoidable, but the problem was then: who should be the next PM? Ahead of the two previous direct elections of a prime minister, there had been little competition for the post, and Samdhong Rinpoche had been elected with an overwhelming majority of the votes both in 2001 and 2006. Fearing that the same would happen again, which would mean that democracy was ‘crippled,’ as one interlocutor mentioned, some Tibetans were determined to get a head start in securing a smooth transition of power.60 The first awareness campaign was launched in September 2008, when former PM (and later the Dalai Lama’s representative in Europe) Thubten Samdup appealed to the Tibetans’ sense of urgency in order to get them involved in the pre-nomination phase. In his opinion, this would give candidates enough time to effectively present their political platform and address key issues, as well as give the constituents time to get to know the candidates and their messages. An important incentive for launching his initiative was to find qualified candidates with different political stances: ‘The goal is to offer a more diversified group of candidates with contrasting viewpoints – reflective of the base.’61 After a slow start, people started to name potential PM candidates, although the candidates themselves, with few exceptions, were reluctant to admit that they actually were candidates. Nevertheless, in the end, the names of over

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20 potential candidates for the office of the prime minister were presented, including former ministers Tenzin Namgyal Tethong and Tashi Wangdu, former speaker Karma Choephel, present speaker Penpa Tsering, deputy speaker Dolma Gyari, the German-based doctor and singer Lobsang Palden Tawo, British-educated Tashi Wangdu, lawyer Phurbu Dorjee and former TYC leaders Tsetan Norbu, Lobsang Jinpa and Lobsang Sangay. In addition to this campaign, many groups and institutions participated in pre-election activities that aimed at generating awareness and encouraging participation and debate. Examples of platforms which attempted to raise awareness include: associations, such as the National Democratic Party of Tibet, the GuChuSum former political prisoners’ organisation, the Tibetan Women’s Association, Students for a Free Tibet and Youth for Better Democracy; the news media, such as the internet platform Phayul and the Shambala Post; radio stations, such as Voice of Tibet and Radio Free Asia; and the printed press. These organisations and media platforms arranged democracy awareness talks and discussions, mock elections, election training and campaign tours. They distributed information about the elections and the candidates on the internet, and even made audio and visual recordings of public events that were distributed free of charge to the public. Moreover, they set up opinion polls and surveys, arranged public discussions and talks with prominent Tibetans, such as the present PM and MPs, all in an attempt to increase awareness well ahead of the elections, especially among exile-Tibetan youth, since it was believed that they were the ones who did not vote in the previous elections. ‘We need the young!’ Thubten Samdup said.62 Furthermore, exile organisations had for a long time been grooming new leaders by offering leadership training targeted especially towards youth, which had been sponsored by international democracy promoters such as the National Endowment for Democracy (see Chapter 3). New technologies were used to inform and incite discussion as well as campaign for the candidates. One could read about the various candidates on the internet, discuss issues and personalities, vote in polls, ask questions to the candidates, listen to or view recordings of public events, evaluate the candidates,

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call for meetings and actions, and download campaign materials for distribution in one’s own community. Initiatives included blogs, public message forums and websites filled with details such as candidate biographies, videos and articles, and interviews for the electorate so that they may make an ‘informed choice’ when naming candidates.63 The 2011 election was perceived overall to be especially important, and many young Tibetans put a lot of hope in the prime minister position as a powerful position from where changes were possible; they reasoned that only top-down initiatives could change Tibetan political culture and practice. Hence, they wanted an innovative and fearless PM who was willing to make changes. But perhaps they overstated the importance, the powers and the role of a Tibetan prime-minister-in-exile, as critical voices suggested. American-based intellectual Jamyang Norbu was more pessimistic and discouraged by Tibetan conservatism. Regarding the prospects for changes, he remarked: I do not want to pour cold water on these hopes and initiatives, which are probably well-intentioned. Nonetheless, they are naı¨ve and misguided in assuming that our political system is a democratic one where an elected prime minister would have the constitutional powers to make fundamental changes in our body politic.64 In his opinion, it was unrealistic to ‘cling to the hope that the election of a transformational political leader could bring about a major change in political direction’.65 Another Tibetan intellectual, Bhuchung K. Tsering, told Tibetans to put their trust in the members of parliament, not the prime minister, if they wanted change: The truth is that if the Tibetans want a change in the political path, it is the Tibetan parliament that they have to look to, not the kalon tripa. To improvise from the American slogan, in the Tibetan case, ‘It’s the parliament, stupid!’66

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The hoped-for changes included the official CTA line of fighting for ‘autonomy’ (rang srid rang skyong) in Tibet which many vociferous Tibetan youth hoped would be changed to ‘independence’ (rang btsan), or they wanted a fresh take on an old problem, the introduction of new strategies – anything that would change the intolerable, liminal status quo. Others were more conservative, seeking continuation and stability in a new leader, and these, as Tibetan journalist Gendun Gyatso complained, inhibited change in Tibetan society. He argued that radicals found their feet stuck in a tradition-oriented society, where people did not want to be seen as wanting to turn their back on tradition, but wanted to preserve old ways. He said: ‘People don’t want to take radical steps, embrace new things. They just want to follow the old order and see how that can be adapted . . . It’s actually the whole mentality of society as a whole, which is conservative.’67 The election became, in many instances, enclosed within a choice between change versus continuity. This was one among several dichotomies that framed pre-election discussions of the candidates. Elections as choices between dichotomies Familiar dichotomies that were invoked in discussions prior to the elections include: change versus continuity; youth versus experience; Western versus Tibetan; international versus regional outreach. Two candidates, Lobsang Sangay and Tenzin Namgyal Tethong, were soon declared the top candidates, and they were portrayed in media and in debates as opposites and as representative of those well-known dichotomies that have bothered, challenged and worried Tibetan exiles. Lobsang Sangay’s US-based life as a scholar with a degree from Harvard Law School (with a SJD dissertation on democracy from 2004) was promoted as his strongest quality, and he was always referred to as ‘Dr’ Lobsang Sangay. He had had a political career in the TYC and Chushi Gangdrug when he was young, of which the highlight was the week he spent in Tihar jail. Compared to his biggest opponent, Tenzin Namgyal Tethong, Lobsang Sangay had no experience from the Dalai Lama’s offices or the CTA, but his

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accomplishments as a fellow at Harvard were recognised by the Department of Education in Dharamsala as ‘equivalent to the community service’, according to the internet site that campaigned for him, www.kalontripafortibet.org. This site promised that he would bring the Tibetan community and democratic community a much-needed fresh change. One of the many campaign posters for his candidacy promoted him under the heading of ‘CHANGE’ with a second title stating, ‘A better Mangtso [democracy] for a FREE Tibet’.68 Lobsang Sangay, was, in the words of Jamyang Norbu, ‘an expressive though sometimes glib speaker’, and received the most pre-election media coverage.69 Some Tibetans even saw him as the fresh and young hope, ‘the Tibetan version of Obama’70 or a ‘Tibetan Obama’.71 The website www.kalontripa2011.org, on the other hand, promoted Tenzin Namgyal Tethong as the experienced candidate. Several support groups, for instance the group TNT 4 KT-2011 on Facebook, asked the electorate to ‘Vote for Leadership. Vote for Integrity. Vote for Vision. Vote for Experience. Vote Tenzin Namgyal Tethong for Kalon Tripa-2011’. Although Tenzin Namgyal Tethong was also a scholar (at Stanford University in Tibetan Studies), it was not his academic career, but his life-long dedication to the Tibetan cause that was highlighted. He had been a representative of the Dalai Lama in New York (1973– 86) and in Washington DC (1987–90); he had started the Tibetan-language magazine Sheja in 1968; and he was instrumental in the establishment of several initiatives, such as the Tibet Fund, the International Campaign for Tibet, Tibet House New York and Potala Publications. Moreover, he was one of the four famous founders of the Tibetan Youth Congress. In 1980 he headed the second delegation sent by the Dalai Lama to Tibet and China, and he also served as a cabinet minister several times, heading ministries such as International Relations, Finance, and Home, and served as the PM for five years (1990– 5). These two candidates were intensely promoted, and their campaign trails – together with the general mobilisation of people and candidates to engage in pre-election activity – was unprecedented in the history of Tibetan democracy. However, as

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much as we see an intensification, we also see how these two candidates were reduced to mere dichotomies which were not based upon differences in their political agendas, and not because there were no agendas, but because of their personalities. Previously Jamyang Norbu had criticised what he called ‘the extreme personality basis of Tibetan politics’ at the expense of discussions of their political stances and the duties and responsibilities of the PM.72 Similarly, Bhuchung K. Tsering had also asked for a public discussion on political issues and policies rather than personalities, personal issues and histories.73 In his mind, the naming of potential candidates and discussing their personalities without first discussing what role a future prime minister would play was like ‘putting the cart before the horse’. Other critical Tibetans who called for a shift in focus from personalities to policies include the editorial board of the Tibetan Political Review, which wrote that instead of evaluating the candidates based on their biography, their electoral platforms had to be analysed.74 Yet the two top candidates became personifications of selected issues conflated into dichotomies: Lobsang Sangay became the candidate representing change, youth, Western values and international appeal; Tenzin Namgyal Tethong became the candidate representing continuity, experience, traditional Tibetan values and regional appeal. Interestingly, Lobsang Sangay had previously identified similar oppositional characteristics of two factions in the parliament, which also reflected the sentiments of the Tibetan exile population as well as the differences between the generations.75 It was these differences, which Lobsang Sangay and Tenzin Namgyal Tethong came to represent, but they became distorted into oversimplified caricatures. The electorate was encouraged to choose between the two different futures of the freedom movement that these two different personalities represented. Which issues were important to them and which policies they would launch as prime ministers faded in relation to these strong but undeserved, stereotypical outlines of choices between change, youth, Western values, and international appeal on the one hand, or continuity, experience, traditional Tibetan values and regional appeal on the other hand.

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Take, for example, the binary of Tibetan versus Western values. The Tibetan Political Review once analysed a debate between the two top candidates in Zurich which set up several dichotomies, one of them being a Western versus Tibetan attitude towards political power: The candidates’ attitude toward political power revealed their most stark difference. While Tenzin Namgyal-la’s standpoint seemed rooted in Tibetan cultural norms of leadership as a humbling responsibility, Lobsang Sangay-la took a more Western-oriented idea that political power should be openly sought.76 The Tibetan Political Review considered Tenzin Namgyal Tethong to represent and express a traditional approach towards leadership as service, while Lobsang Sangay stood for the Western approach of open competition in which you do not deny that you are seeking political office.77 It was also Lobsang Sangay’s Western-like style and lack of experience in Dharamsala exile politics that for some made him look like the politically naı¨ve of the two candidates. For instance, the Tibetan Political Review argued that Lobsang Sangay was caught up in theoretical and unrealistic ideas, and that his academic background could not replace his lack of experience of holding political office and working with the political reality. In the opinion of Tibetan Political Review, Lobsang Sangay was ‘a political novice who is unable to mix theory with reality’.78 He nevertheless had assumed the image of the young candidate in a positive sense: the candidate whom youth preferred, and the candidate who was youthful himself. Lobsang Sangay’s profile spoke to many young Tibetans, some of whom endorsed him and posted their opinions on internet.79 They attached to his youthfulness the ability to make changes, to apply new policies and tactics, even to take a tougher approach towards China.80 Some of his supporters even presented him as the choice in accordance with the Dalai Lama’s wishes. For instance, there were supporters who publicly announced their support and, at the same time, related how the Dalai Lama himself had expressed the desire for

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a young prime minister. When the website kalontripafortibet.org was inaugurated, the Tibetan monk and former political prisoner Palden Gyatso, who had become internationally renowned for his biography Fire under the Snow, told the press that his support of Lobsang Sangay was in line with the wishes of the Dalai Lama. He was quoted in Phayul as saying: We all know that it is an expressed wish of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to have a young, energetic, educated and dedicated Tibetan as an elected leader. And I also personally believe there is a need for some kind of change in our long-held traditional approach. So Dr Lobsang Sangay’s all-rounded personality gives me the confidence to support him wholeheartedly.81 It is uncertain whether, when and where the Dalai Lama has stated that someone young should assume the PM position.82 Samdhong Rinpoche had previously said that the community of Tibetan exiles needed a young and modern political leadership,83 and told the Guardian: ‘The age of the old monks is passing, and we are looking forward to a young, energetic, lay leadership.’84 When election day came, the majority of the Tibetan electorate replaced the ageing Samdhong Rinpoche with a new lay leadership.

Change of power The election was conducted in three stages. First, the electorate had to register before 18 August 2010 and, secondly, they had to nominate their candidates by 3 October 2010.85 Only 61 per cent out of the 79,449 registered voters participated in the election process.86 The Election Commission announced the top six candidates emerging from the nomination.87 The winner was Lobsang Sangay with 22,489 votes, which was a 10,000 vote lead to the second candidate Tenzin Namgyal Tethong with 12,319 votes.88 After the preliminary round, Phayul reported that Lobsang Sangay applauded the Tibetan electorate: ‘It means that His Holiness’s vision of a fully functional Tibetan democracy, which China sees as a real threat and

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seeks to undermine, is now being realised.’89 Pre-election activities intensified and aimed at: getting people engaged, increasing voter participation and informing the public on the elections in general. But what really made a change in this election was that only ten days ahead of the final election round, the Dalai Lama announced his retirement from politics.90 Now the election turned into the election of someone who could save their struggle in a time of transition, a leader who would be able to unite the Tibetans and lead the Tibetan freedom movement. The third and final round, the general election, took place on 20 March 2011, and Tibetans queued up in front of the ballot boxes. The increased engagement in terms of voter-turnout numbers was a testament to the importance that this particular election had received in comparison to previous elections. The voter turnout was 58.97 per cent, which was a significant leap from 44.26 per cent in the 2006 election.91 Lobsang Saygay came out as the winner with 27,051 votes (55 per cent).92 The runner-up was Tenzin Namgyal Tethong with 18,405 (37 per cent) of the votes, and the third candidate was Tashi Wangdi with 3,173 (6 per cent) votes.93 The question, then remains: apart from increased pre-election activity and voter turnout, did the election of Lobsang Sangay prove the victory of modernity over tradition, internationalisation over regionalism, or youth over experience? Had Tibetan exiles voted for change? Did these elections signal a change in the ways in which people relate to leadership, and how they translate democracy? The very short answer is: not likely. Some Tibetans have suggested that the election of Lobsang Sangay marks a shift of paradigm in that the Tibetans – contrary to dominant political practice (as we have also seen in Chapter 3) – elected a man who had openly solicited votes. Journalist Gendun Gyatso had also recognised the novelty of campaigning ahead of the 2011 elections, but he dismissed the possibility that there has been a paradigm shift, since he could not recognise a ‘true change within people’.94 In our conversation in 2012, he argued that I had merely spoken to the vociferous minority of Tibetans who had been actively engaged in campaigns and debates ahead of the election. On the contrary, he claimed, the majority of

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Tibetans aimed for maintaining the status quo: ‘Right now the Dalai Lama looms large, and the Tibetan people’s traditional mindset is very, very strong. Therefore, change cannot come that easily.’95 Gendun Gyatso pointed to the overall impression that the Dalai Lama’s omnipresence among exile-Tibetans’ considerations for their present and future course of possible actions has limited the extent of which progress and changes in exile politics could take place, in the sense that the possibility of going against the Dalai Lama’s political stance has had poor prospects (see also Chapter 6). Neither of the two candidates had suggested policy changes that would replace the Dalai Lama’s policies that were adhered to in the CTA. Judging from the many offices that he had held, Tenzin Namgyal Tethong had closer ties to Dharamsala and the Dalai Lama than Lobsang Sangay. Lobsang Sangay, moreover, as Gendun Gyatso told me, had successfully vied for the support from the monasteries, and this was what counted in the long run. As long as Lobsang Sangay does not undermine the Dalai Lama, the monasteries and conservative Tibetan exiles will accept him. Moreover, Lobsang Sangay was soon endorsed by the Dalai Lama. During his swearing-in ceremony on 8 August 2011, the Dalai Lama gave a speech in which he drew upon events which occurred in his own life during this special occasion and established a historical connection. The Dalai Lama explained in his speech how he was transferring political leadership that he had been given in 1950 by the regent of Tibet. He made the comparison explicit when he said, ‘I assumed from Taktra Rinpoche the responsibility of political leader [srid skyong gi ‘gan bzhes ] in the system of the old Tibetan society 60 years ago . . . Today, I transfer this to the popularly elected Lobsang Sangay.’96 The political office is here defined by the Dalai Lama in Tibetan as srid skyong and explained as a concept that had been part of Tibetan convention in the past, and now it was turned into an office in which one was democratically elected.97 Lobsang Sangay was the winner of the third direct election of a bka’ blon khri pa, but in this new translation, he continued past political leadership once held by regents and Dalai Lamas. Hence, the new PM was not just taking over the office of bka’ blon khri pa after Samdhong Rinpoche, but he in

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fact inherited the Dalai Lama’s political responsibilities. Now that the Dalai Lama had distanced himself from his political leadership by devolving his political power, he, at the same time, made sure to create an explicit link connecting himself and a Tibetan past to Lobsang Sangay. The Dalai Lama confirmed that although srid skyong was an old concept, ‘Srid skyong Lobsang Sangay was the first person who had been democratically elected and had complete authority.’98 One year later, the parliament decided to amend the charter so that Lobsang Sangay’s new official title became srid skyong, a ‘political leader’, and not bka’ blon khri pa, which had been the title held by Samdhong Rinpoche.99 We can conclude that the many pre-election activities attracted more engagement, secured more deliberation, produced more candidates to choose from, facilitated competition and probably also increased political awareness. This increased attention to the details of the procedural aspects of democracy may also have increased the legitimacy of democracy in the minds of the Tibetan exile electorate. It does not, however, indicate a paradigm shift in the translation of democracy, since democracy continues to be understood as a gift from the Dalai Lama, in which elections are a key feature. Moreover, the enchantment of Tibetan democracy has also been maintained under the lay leadership of Lobsang Sangay, although perhaps in a different and slightly altered version. It has not become a disenchanted, secular position in the Weberian sense since Buddhism continues to colour political speech and political rituals, and the enchantment of the Dalai Lama still portends the legitimisation of political leadership. Perhaps Lobsang Sangay’s ‘Western-style’ election campaign pushed pre-election political behaviour from apathy to engagement, but we have yet to see a new paradigm in their translations of democracy.

CHAPTER 6 FREEDOM STRUGGLE OVER DEMOCRACY

Theories on democratic transition have generally placed democracy and democratisation within a framework of the nation state; however, in this book I have expanded the focus by including the political realm of exile. Political exiles, as defined by Shain, reside temporarily in a guest country where they are politically active to various degrees, trying ‘to create circumstances favourable to their return’.1 One commonly applied strategy is to adopt the universalistic discourse on democracy and organise a government-in-exile along democratic ideals.2 Shain explains how a government-in-exile is better positioned to obtain international diplomatic recognition if it has emerged from lawful democratic election. Since democratic principles are the main guidelines for granting, withholding or withdrawing recognition from governments, democracy can be a strategy that supports an exile movement’s claim to power.3 While international support can determine the outcome of their struggle, a government-in-exile is, however, dependent upon internal support. This dependency on internal support is also highly relevant in the Tibetan case, and has been invoked regularly in the political life of Tibetan exiles in India. The tension which arises among Tibetan exiles from depending on this internal support is thus the topic of this chapter. Democratisation has the potential to create and consolidate external and internal support, i.e. international recognition and

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national loyalty respectively. However, that which is necessary for a successful homecoming – national loyalty – is not, I argue, contingent upon democracy. On the contrary, according to some Tibetans, democracy-building itself has become an impediment to a swift return to a free Tibet. It is here we discover tension between democracy-building and the struggle for freedom, something that Shain glossed over in his seminal work on political exiles,4 but which has been a constant tension in the democracy-building efforts among Tibetans-in-exile. Moreover, the uneasiness perceived among some Tibetan exiles with regard to democracy itself has become evident when it has been aligned with what Anderson has coined ‘longdistance nationalism’.5 This chapter reveals that although many Tibetans perceive democratisation and the freedom struggle as intertwined purposes for organising themselves in exile, and although they in theory might recognise Shain’s argument that democratisation enhances their chances for a return to free Tibet, there are other concerns that nonetheless place the freedom struggle in contrast to democratisation. This observation largely corroborates the findings by Lobsang Sangay, who in his Harvard SJD thesis presented this dilemma as an ‘inherent paradox’ for a government-in-exile that undergoes democratisation.6 Lobsang Sangay discussed whether one could argue that democracy has actually undermined the Tibetan freedom movement. As an example, he took the controversy which took place in the year 2000 of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile’s deliberation of the Dalai Lama’s recommendation to change the ways in which the prime minister (bka’ blon) and the cabinet (bka’ shag) were constituted in order to strengthen democracy. Lobsang Sangay, who 11 years later was himself democratically elected to the post as the Tibetan prime-minister-in-exile, recognised in the parliament’s 2000 deliberation what he called ‘lively debates between advocates of tradition and modernity, spirituality and democracy, progressive and static/regressive steps’.7 He boiled the many facets of the discussions down to the viewpoints of two distinct exile-Tibetan groups who, he claimed, were opposed along these lines: one group being in favour of reversing the democratisation process in order to strengthen the exile

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movement, and the other group professing the compatibility of democracy and the freedom struggle. While both young and old support democracy, Lobsang Sangay has identified several ‘opponents of democracy’ among elder Tibetans who upon coming to India have taken positions in the CTA, from where they had relentlessly worked for Tibet’s freedom: ‘These people advocate devoting every minute of their lives to the national struggle. They remain conservatively nationalist and resistant to making changes. To them democracy is chaotic; it distracts and potentially harms the national struggle.’8 Discussions in the Tibetan parliament-in-exile reveal conflicting views regarding what a Tibetan model of democracy should look like, as we saw in the discussions on its procedures of selection for the prime minister and the cabinet in 2000, but also during their discussions one decade earlier when the parliament debated the place of chos (religion) in the definition of the Tibetan polity (cf. Chapter 4). Nevertheless, these discussions cannot simply be reduced to disagreements between proponents supporting one or the other of the well-known and oft-utilised binaries: tradition vs modernity, spirituality vs democracy, progression vs stagnation, etc. Instead, as I will show throughout the following, these discussions are symptomatic of the friction evident among efforts to build democracy and the freedom struggle, which has in turn become an issue regarding the complex and unresolved problem of the simultaneous engagement and resistance between democracy and the freedom struggle. These two aspirations are not, however, inherently opposed, albeit for some of the Tibetans that Lobsang Sangay has interviewed, they were inherently contradictory, while for others, it has been easy to favour one over the other. What I have found, moreover, is that the friction between democracy and the freedom struggle does not mean that Tibetan exiles have been forced to choose one aspiration over the other. Even those who have been committed to democracy-building may at times experience how democracy might be counterproductive within the freedom struggle. Furthermore, instead of asking whether the Tibetans’ translations of democracy – as they are manifested in institutions, procedures, political culture and discourse – work as successful strategies or are

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counterproductive to the freedom struggle, instead I look more closely at the friction between these two aspirations and discuss two facets which have been key to understanding exile politics and competing translations of democracy. First is the concern among some Tibetans that the building and maintenance of democracy in exile have been distracting the exiles’ efforts at a critical time when the freedom struggle must take precedence. In this view, the democratisation project is seen as counterproductive. The second uneasy issue of friction between the freedom struggle and democracybuilding regards the delicate balance of allowing for the democratic ideals of pluralism, inclusion and contestation on the one hand, and securing national loyalty and unity in exile on the other. In this view, the freedom struggle represents unity and national interests, while democracy is translated as self-interest and disagreement. It is especially the deeply felt need for unity which has permeated exileTibetan politics, since unity has been seen as the key for securing a

Figure 6.1 Outside the community hall in Village 11, with the camp leader surrounded by some of the residents there, January 2007.

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successful homecoming – the very reason for remaining as uprooted refugees and not settling as a diaspora. What this chapter shows through this two-fold discussion is that unity has been a deeply felt ideal that Tibetan exiles have struggled with, and has shaped the field of opportunities for exile politics, and, more importantly, the translations of democracy. Democracy has become unthinkable without freedom, and freedom can only be actualised by a united Tibetan people. Taking the cue from the key concept of unity that is at the centre for understanding exile politics, I end the chapter by extending the discussion of unity to encompass Tibetans living in Tibet. I present the ‘inside– outside dilemma’ of political exiles, and their strongly felt need to bridge the gap between the exiles and Tibetans living in Tibet.

Exile temporality versus diaspora permanence In writings related to Tibetans living outside of Tibet, the concepts of Tibetan refugee, Tibetan exile community and the Tibetan diaspora have been indiscriminately applied. When Tibetans talk about their collective conditions abroad, it is clear that they talk about an exile situation in that they have left their homeland because of an overwhelming need to do so, and through political activities they have worked to transform the home country regime. For political exiles, exile has been a ‘temporary expedient’ and not a final abandonment of the nation state.9 I once discussed exile politics with Sonam Topgyal, a Tibetan teacher with a political science degree from Scandinavia. In his home in Mussoorie, we talked about exile politics, and he explained the differences between Tibetan democracy and the democracy models proposed in the textbooks that he had read at university. According to him, Tibetan translations necessarily had to be different, not because of an inability to parrot any Western prototype, but because translation unavoidably is culturally sensitive, and because it is a process which takes place in exile. Because the freedom struggle was the initial purpose for moving into exile, democracy-building had been a slow and imperfect process. He argued:

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As a people living in exile, our most important effort has to be towards pursuing our goal of complete independence. So, personally, complete independence itself is a huge task. It requires a lot of time and energy. At the same time we have to try to democratise our society – again an extremely big challenge. We have a lot of challenges and tasks before us to democratise our society, and that requires a lot of time and energy at the community level and at the administration level. If we have good leaders, I think we don’t need elections and things like that, but of course democracy aims to choose good leaders . . . Like, India got independence in 1947, so they don’t have to worry about getting independence. They don’t have to do anything to pursue independence. The government and people can focus all their energy towards solving all those internal problems. In our case it is a little different . . . Since we have limited time and energy as a people, as a society, that means we have to do all these things together at the same time. Then it’s going to face setbacks.10 Tibetan exiles are faced with two immense life projects at the same time, and the question that bothers some is whether democracybuilding and its maintenance are consuming the Tibetans’ energy and limited resources when time is limited and critical. Therefore, in this manner, when Tibetans translate democracy, their translations – taking on different forms and highlighting different aspects of the multi-layered translation of democracy – have been contained within the freedom struggle in that it is defined and restricted by the framework of returning to a free Tibet.11 In official exile discourse, Tibetans are political exiles who are resisting assimilation into the host country, and who are committed to return to the homeland, hinting at an expression of long-distance nationalism, which is defined by Anderson as the allegiance to a place of origin where one no longer lives.12 Similarly, 76-year-old Yeshe Tarchin’s expressed longing exemplifies a political loyalty which is not fixed to the country where he resides, but to where he longs towards. In Tibet he used to be a soldier in the Tibetan

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government army (gzhung dmag mi). He left his wife and child, and fled to India where he dedicated his life to the freedom struggle. He was, first, a soldier in the Indian army in the special Tibetan unit Establishment 22 (two two dmag mi) in Chakrata for 17 years, because he wanted to get whatever chance he could to fight the Chinese. Later he fought as an activist doing whatever he could to support the various exile organisations who fought for Tibetan freedom. I met this modest and poor retired soldier in his home in Dekyiling in 2006. A fellow friend and TYC activist introduced him as a man who goes at length to help others and ‘do the right thing’ without asking any favours in return. Together with young Tibetan activists, Yeshe Tarchin had carried out a hunger strike the year before, continuing his hunger strike when he was jailed. When I talked with him, he lamented the fact that he had been force-fed in jail, and therefore had broken his vow not to eat. During our conversation, he defended the use of violence in the freedom struggle and explained that it is of utmost importance to return to one’s birthplace. I had heard from several elders that it was a great shame to die outside of Tibet, and Yeshe Tarchin also expressed this when he said: We have to die on the place where we were born, right? It would be a shame to die on other people’s land. If we die here then it is a shame. We must die in our own country for better or for worse. So do you think that in your lifetime, Tibet will gain its independence? It is possible to get if the Tibetan people unite as one.13 Not only did Yeshe Tarchin point to return as the only acceptable end goal of life in exile, but also to the unity which is essential to fulfil the exile’s dream of return. This long-distance nationalism has in turn been nurtured from exile and transferred to new generations who are constantly reminded that they should long for a distant home and continuously remain uprooted. From a safe distance in exile, Tibetans can work according to their political principles and be self-conscious

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about their politically informed culture, traditions, and so forth.14 I have already pointed out in the Introduction how Tibetan exiles have utilised resources and symbols for promoting long-distance nationalism; thus, I elaborate here on the creation and maintenance of national cohesion in an ‘imagined community’ residing in exile. One concrete example of this effort of establishing national cohesion is the infrastructure of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile. Instead of adopting a multi-party system based on exile constituency, it has been built upon a matrix that ideally represents the Tibet they once left and aspire to return to in that seats in the parliament are allocated according to regional and religious categories to which every Tibetan should belong. The present religion –region matrix of the parliament defines the character and boundaries of the Tibetan people by dividing them into laity and clergy who originate from one of the three Tibetan regions and adhere to one of five religious traditions recognised as being Tibetan.15 This parliament matrix is a practical arrangement, but also a symbolic representation of the Tibetan nation’s composition and territory. Similarly, at the core of Anderson’s concept of long-distance nationalism are the two aspects of a collective identity focused on the homeland and a political loyalty that lies outside the country where one resides. It is also these two aspects of a homelandfocused nation in exile, I argue, that are key to understanding exile politics in a Tibetan context and the inherent tensions between democracy and freedom struggle: Tibetans residing in India should stay uprooted and continuously work for their return, and not settle down as a national diaspora. Thus, we evoke here in our analysis a distinction between exile and diaspora,16 i.e. that of being a Tibetan living abroad who continuously works for her return to the home country, and that of being a Tibetan living abroad who continuously works to secure her settled life in the guest country. This distinction allows us to recognise a common and very real threat for the Tibetans, namely that their movement will lose momentum, and that they will accept their exile condition as sufficient and hence settle down. Moreover, the way in which Tibetan exiles in India organise themselves is also meant to be a method for regaining their lost homeland. The Dalai Lama and Dharamsala-based institutions would

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like Tibetans to understand that they have to prepare for a return to Tibet, taking with them the experiences and knowledge of democracy that can replace the present non-democratic and un-Tibetan government in Tibet. Because the exiles, contrary to Tibetans in Tibet, have the freedom to exercise democracy in India, the Tibetan leadership would like people to recognise that it is their duty to learn and practise democracy. If a democratic mind-set is developed while in exile, democratic practices can be acted out in future Tibet based on previous experiences in exile. For Yeshe Tarchin, there was a clear connection between the freedom struggle and democracy, and he recognised the Tibetans’ duty to work for both, although one preceded the other: [The Dalai Lama] gave us this democracy. Unlike us, other countries had to pay a lot to get it, right? So now that we have been given democracy, we cannot sit idle just saying ‘this is democracy.’ When we talk about democracy, we need a country and democracy, right? If we have our own country, then democracy can be actualised as well . . . We have lost our own country to another people, and we cannot just fall asleep in some other people’s country and say ‘this is democracy.’17 Democracy has to come with a given territory, Yeshe Tarchin explained, and ensuring freedom in Tibet is obviously the first step towards establishing a democracy. However, this particular translation of democracy recognises that democracy could only be realised in a country that was free, while other Tibetans have translated democracy as freedom itself. I heard this translation repeated among young Tibetans, both at the political centre of Dharamsala and in the remote settlements. One woman who made this connection was another activist and representative of the young generation, 26-year-old Norzin Wangmo, who was one of the principal organisers of Youth for Better MPs (see Chapter 3). She emphasised that the two in reality are the same struggle, because both are related to taking your rights: ‘For me, freedom struggle and democracy is the same thing. It’s the rights, fight for your rigts. It’s the same thing.’18 The same point was made in an

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editorial of Tibetan World, an English-language magazine for Tibetan youth, urging them to vote at the elections for the fourteenth parliament. An editorial in 2005 appealed to the youth’s sense of patriotism and linked fighting for Tibet that rightfully belongs to Tibetans with taking the rights of democracy that is theirs in free India. The appeal started with lines from a song sung by Bob Marley that is popular among youth the world over. In the Tibetan context, it referred not only to the freedom struggle, but also to exert one’s rights within a democracy: ‘Get up, stand up, stand up for your rights / Get up, stand up, don’t give up the fight.’19 One of the writers of Tibetan World, 23-year-old university student Trinle Chodon in New Delhi, explained to me that the democratisation efforts were not secondary to the freedom struggle but a prerequisite.20 In fact, he related, it is imperative to have a strong, democratic set-up in exile in order to sustain freedom. In this way, democratisation is part and parcel of the freedom struggle. Although the freedom struggle and democracy-building have been intertwined in this way, among the translations made by many young, and at times elder, Tibetans, there generally has been a clear division in the interest that they show towards democracy-building and the freedom struggle. While Tibetans partake in the freedom struggle by attending rallies and the like, participating in democracy-building has taken a backseat for many. The source of the problem is partly due to many Tibetans who view the two as disconnected projects in which ‘free Tibet’ represents a ‘higher cause’, compared to democracy that is identified as ‘lower politics’. Some Tibetans warn about the danger of placing their priorities wrong and neglecting the freedom struggle, when in fact it is the step which precedes democracy and is more urgent. One example is a speech to the TYC in 1995 by former editor of the English-language magazine Rangzen and central figure in both the TYC and the Dalai Lama’s offices, Tashi Phuntsok.21 He ended his speech by reminding the members that it is important to prioritise the freedom struggle before democracy: Finally, I am of the view that our first priority is to regain our country. So that we can govern ourselves, and probably on the

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democratic system that we espouse. I cannot, for all that democracy may have to offer, trade priorities. With our 35 years of experience, we are far ahead of many nations of the world in our maturity in democratic principles. But should such a thing come to prevail – that is our experiment with democracy continues to receive first priority and the Tibetan freedom struggle the second – as it has become amply clear over the years, I can only say that we have lost heart to face the real challenge head on and have taken up a trendy cause instead. Tashi Phuntsok suggested that fellow exiles had let the secondary goal of democracy-building precede the very raison d’eˆtre for organising in exile: the struggle for freedom. In this way, they have hooked on to a movement of claiming democracy that is a common strategy for political exiles. Another aspect of concern has been the fear that democracybuilding is equated with settling down, living comfortable lives rather than upholding exile’s temporality and working for the national goal of return; the fight to return to Tibet should take precedence. The most critical voices supporting this view even claim that democracy has become a project that has displaced efforts towards the freedom struggle onto the task of reproducing bureaucracy. This corroborates with the cross-national study of political exiles by Shain that has shown how exile organisations often become ends in themselves, and that they mainly work to survive and reproduce their own organisation.22 The stated purpose of exile is not, however, to build a state-like polity in exile (that is only a means to an end), but to fight for a free Tibet and to return to Tibet. MP Karma Yeshi expressed a similar concern during one of our talks in 2007. Although he valued democracy and stressed that it had to be learned while in exile in order to bring democracy to Tibet in the future, he nonetheless expressed democracy as being secondary to the struggle for freedom. He was concerned that the CTA was establishing ‘stability’ and ‘security’ in the exile community, which has caused some Tibetans to settle down and lead comfortable lives instead of remaining as uprooted refugees

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ready to return at any moment. According to Karma Yeshi, administering the CTA and running democratic institutions were big tasks, and therefore, the CTA itself might hinder the freedom struggle and make Tibetans lose sight of why they were in exile: ‘The goal is not to be the best refugee community in the world but to free Tibet and to return to Tibet.’23

Unity versus diversity When I asked Sherab Sangpo, a 30-year-old researcher working in Dharamsala, if the freedom struggle was placed as a larger priority than democracy among Tibetans, he answered that the freedom struggle was about unity, and democracy was about diversity. He thought that might be a reason why Tibetan exiles could relate to and participate in the freedom struggle more than in the democratisation process: [The] freedom struggle demands unity, solid foundation, everyone to follow one direction [. . .] but democracy is all about diversity, all about opinions, and because of this, people are very confused. People don’t want to play different kinds of opinions. To them it is more like creation of confusion through this democracy. So this is one big factor why people are pushing [democracy] back. They want only one path to be shown to them, you know, one direction to be shown to them by one leader, not have hundreds of leaders like in a democratic community and have hundreds of diversified options as in a democratic community. So this is one big factor which is in fact harming the democratisation process in the Tibetan community.24 Sherab Sangpo’s analysis pointed to the conclusion that my own findings have also directed me towards. There is apparent friction between the freedom struggle representing unity versus democracy representing factionalism, and this causes some Tibetans to place the freedom struggle above democratisation.

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For many Tibetan exiles whose chief concern is a united struggle for freedom, one problem with democracy is that it is a source for diversity and consequently disunity. This is because democracy involves different opinions, even opposition, rather than agreement. This does not agree with the Tibetan political culture which has been ruled by a strong norm of unity and loyalty, as the findings of other scholars also support.25 And moreover, a disunited freedom struggle, Tibetans fear, will not lead them anywhere. They especially fear factionalism stemming from two sources: communalism and polyvocality.26 If we start with the first, Tibetans’ fear of communalism must be understood in the context of post-colonial India where it has been seen as a tremendous hurdle. In India, with its secular constitution and status as ‘the biggest democracy in the world’, it is nonetheless a conflict-ridden country based upon communal identities, i.e. conflicts between Hindu communities in conflict with its minority ‘Other’, be it Dalits, Muslims, or Christians.27 Tibetans define communalism as the discord between groups stemming from different home districts or being affiliated with different religious traditions which further regionalism and sectarianism respectively (chol kha dang chos lugs thog nas ’then ’khyer). The problem of communalism has been addressed repeatedly in the speeches by the Dalai Lama telling Tibetans that the exile situation demands a united effort in which they should not discriminate between the religious traditions or home districts since they all are ‘people who eat roasted barley’, i.e. they are first and foremost Tibetans.28 Communalism, in short, is a major concern because it touches upon issues of what it means to be a Tibetan, and to where one’s allegiance lies. Overall, interviewees agreed that there is no place for sectarianism and regionalism in the struggle for freedom. MP Karma Yeshi, for example, stressed that first and foremost they are Tibetans, and secondly they belong to a region. Even the Chinese aggressors, he said, never differentiated between regions but treated all Tibetans equally badly. ‘We are all equal’, Karma Yeshi concluded.29 His opinion echoed several interlocutors, who assured me that Tibetans work together regardless of regional affiliations. In my experience, many young Tibetan exiles are unaware of their friends’ regional

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origin, and some are themselves children of inter-regional marriages. They have created, in the words of one interlocutor, ‘families of the chol kha gsum [the three provinces of Tibet]’.30 However, many young Tibetans fear regionalism as a real threat to their national freedom struggle and are concerned about its dominance, especially among the elders who at times have been very proud and preoccupied by their regional origin in that they have organised into home-district associations (skyid sdug). A critique against the home-district associations addresses how they actually organise regionalism, which then causes splits in Tibetan society, and thus hinders democracy and a national struggle in exile. One of the reasons for this scepticism towards the home-district associations is that some associations have engaged in politics and a fight for power. This is especially true for the big, regional umbrella organisations. Tsultrim Dorje, who in 2006 worked as a staff member at the regional umbrella organisation Ngari United Association, agreed that unity in exile was imperative, but he did not see his own organisation as causing division along regional lines. He talked about a pan-Tibetan identity that erased small differences between people. Tsultrim Dorje said: People feel that we need to be united now. If we divide ourselves on the basis of province, caste and religion, it will not help us. If Tibetans have to solve their own problem, we need to be united. We need to call ourselves Tibetans, right? . . . We live in a country which does not belong to us; we are refugees, and it’s important that we are united. We should not create small divisions between each other because the Chinese are trying their best to create a division in the Tibetan community. We should make them realise that we are strong Tibetans . . . We should call ourselves Tibetans first and that’s the most important thing. What is it that makes you Tibetan? I know this is a very difficult question. No, it’s not difficult. First of all, the most important thing is the leadership of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, no doubt about

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that. Whenever it comes to His Holiness’s leadership, offering a long life prayer ceremony to His Holiness’s leadership – everybody does this. If somebody makes a strong allegation against His Holiness the Dalai Lama, then people come and shout. When Chinese are trying to kill someone, for us it’s not important whether he’s Amdo, whether he’s these things. For us he’s a Tibetan. That kind of feeling is between us because we feel that we are Tibetan refugees. We are not calling ourselves Ngari refugees. We never say Dotoe refugee. The feeling of belonging as Tibetans is there. Buddhism unites us, along with the leadership of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. We practise the same religion. We speak the same language, maybe dialect is different, but we speak the same language. We practise the same religion . . . But aren’t there Tibetan Muslims and Christians as well? Right. Do they also look towards His Holiness as their leader? When it comes to leadership, whether you belong to that religion, if you are a Tibetan, everybody respects His Holiness’s leadership. And I’m talking about political leadership. When it comes to religious leadership, Muslim people cannot listen to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Why? Because they belong to this kind of religion. His Holiness the Dalai Lama is a leader, a religious guru, Tibetan kind of religion, you know. So when we are talking political leadership, leading the country, His Holiness is a very good leader.31 Tsultrim Dorje identified religion and language as shared by all Tibetan nationals, and he asserted that everybody, regardless of their sectarian affiliations, views the Dalai Lama as the leader of the Tibetan nation and turns to him for political guidance. The Dalai Lama also seems to transcend the smaller divisions among Tibetans. The Tibetan Muslims and Christians whom I interviewed have confirmed that they supported the CTA politically, but not religiously since it is a

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Buddhist government, and that they saw the Dalai Lama as a political leader or a king. Overall, there seems to be an agreement that the Dalai Lama is a source of Tibetan unity that overrides regional – and in most cases even religious – identity, and that loyalty is defined as loyalty towards him. Nonetheless, as we shall see in a later section, his leadership has also been challenged. As a matter of fact, unity in exile has been an asset that Tibetans have to struggle for. Although the Dalai Lama’s repeated appeals to his countrymen that they are Tibetans regardless of religious and regional adherence signal that he regards unity as central to the survival of the Tibetan nation, he is not asking for a unity that eliminates the need for polyvocality. Polyvocality is a second element which together with communalism is usually singled out as detrimental to their political cause. There are many Tibetan exiles who mistakenly label polyvocality as the derogative term ‘opposition’, who ask fellow Tibetans to keep quiet about the shortcomings and problems of exile, and who discourage open disagreement in order to maintain unity at all costs. In the highly politically charged environment of exile, contesting political views has become a delicate balance between, on the one hand, proving loyalty and displaying unity and, on the other hand, voicing one’s opinion.32 This has meant that political opposition is not easily dealt with, and that the space for contestation has been limited by a deeply felt need for unity. For instance, there has been no formal opposition in the parliament, although the parliament itself is said to function as an opposition to the cabinet. The parliament-inexile has even opposed the Dalai Lama’s propositions on several occasions. For example, it has opposed the Dalai Lama’s wish to withdraw from politics, his suggestions to have two houses in the parliament and a multi-party system, and his definition of the CTA as secular, all of which have been proposals that nowadays are promoted by the National Democratic Party of Tibet (NDPT). The only political party surviving in exile, the NDPT, was born out of the tension of maintaining unity while allowing for polyvocality during the democracy-building process. It has legitimised its existence by pointing to both the Dalai Lama’s recommendations for a multi-party system and to the general discourse on the benefits of establishing a

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liberal democracy. The TYC and the NDPT leadership have argued that the special exile circumstance does not revoke the need for polyvocality and formal opposition, and that no-partyism cripples democracy. However, in the opinion of Tibetan intellectual Jamyang Norbu, the Dalai Lama’s semi-divine position in itself has curbed polyvocality.33 As long as the Dalai Lama gives his opinion on not only moral, spiritual and even quotidian issues, but also political issues, he will stifle speech that, in the words of Jamyang Norbu: ‘Even in his retirement His Holiness has political powers, relatively speaking of course, that the president of a democracy can only dream about.’34 The Dalai Lama knows that his presence causes self-censorship among his Tibetan adherents, and therefore also limits the democratic-ness of exile politics. In his speeches to the nation, he has encouraged Tibetans to enact their democratic freedom to voice their different opinions and even to disagree, and in 2008 he insisted that the Tibetans deliberate on the future course of their freedom struggle explicitly stating that his position impeded political contestation.35 The translation of democracy as polyvocality and diversity is prominent, especially among young Tibetans who insist that as long as democracy is the ideal, there must be public space allowing for contestation. In a democracy, they understand this to be their right, and this right was a gift given to the Tibetans from the Dalai Lama himself. Nevertheless, although the Dalai Lama has expressed he would like Tibetans to speak freely, even the mentioning of his name has stifled free speech. The 37-year-old TYC activist Pema Dolma, who has an MA from an American university, explained how the Dalai Lama’s name constrained free speech in Tibetan society because opinions expressed during discussions were in danger of being weighed against the moral and political guidelines that Tibetans receive through his speeches (cf. Chapter 1). She said during our talk in 2012: [The Dalai Lama,] he has given you voice . . . He has given you democracy, and the democratic rights have come with it to express and to have different views, because this is what democracy is . . . Democracy is having the liberty to have

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differing opinions, but also allowing different voices to grow and thrive. This is what he is giving. If you say: ‘Oh, by voicing your different opinions, you are going against His Holiness’, then again, we are going back to the same endless discussion. Very often I tell my friends that if you are going to have a discussion about rang btsan [independence] and autonomy, don’t mention His Holiness and let’s have an argument. The moment you bring His Holiness [into the discussion] I’m not going to have any discussion any more, because I can’t.36 She framed her translation of democracy within the dominant meta-narrative in which democracy has been translated as a gift from the Dalai Lama upon going into exile (see the Introduction), but democracy in this case has been translated as polyvocality. Nevertheless, this polyvocality was, according to Pema Dolma, tentative, due to the overarching moral authority of the Dalai Lama. Only mentioning his name could shatter a conversation or silence the opponent. What Pema Dolma related was a feeling shared by many young Tibetans, that evaluating statements as going along or against the Dalai Lama’s guidelines was a strategy that some resorted to in order to mute the opponent. Some Tibetan institutions, such as schools, had debate rules that included a prohibition against mentioning the Dalai Lama’s name during classroom discussions in order to construct productive and open conversations among the school children. Similarly, Pema Dolma asked her discussion partners not to mention the Dalai Lama when they debated whether the goal of their freedom struggle was ‘independence’ (rang btsan) or ‘autonomy’ (rang srid rang skyong), which was the official line of the Dalai Lama, PM Lobsang Sangay and the CTA.

Displaying disloyalty and disrupting unity Tibetans have thus been placed in a vulnerable political position, and this has created a deeply felt need for establishing unity. For many Tibetan exiles, unity has been of paramount importance to the survival and success of ‘the Tibetan cause’. The problem, however, has

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been that the ‘political world of the exile is anything but united’.37 The prominent philosopher Taylor theorised that one necessary ingredient in the modern and secular nation state is patriotism, and by that he meant nationalist sentiment: ‘A strong identification with the polity, and a willingness to give of oneself for its sake.’38 Another important component to a modern nation state, according to Taylor, which is also related to the Tibetan fixation upon unity, is that the primary identity is not communal, but based upon the principle of citizenship. To Tibetans, inter- and intra-exile conflicts and discord between groups (often blamed upon factionalism stemming from communalism and polyvocality, as we saw in the previous section) have been regarded as signs of disunity that in many instances could divert energy and focus from the ultimate goal of return. Or worse: conflicts could split the community and hurt the national struggle. It has been a source of great embarrassment for many Tibetans that their society has been showing signs of fragmentation and discord. Since the beginning of exile, there have been innumerable conflicts among Tibetans, some of which have caused enormous tensions and divisions challenging the unity that the Tibetans claim to have and promote. In some cases, these controversies have also challenged the CTA’s claim to be a democratic institution. During many conversations with Tibetans residing in India, I sometimes listened to what sounded like slanderous talk and gossip about fellow exiles: I learned about Chinese spies, agent provocateurs, dissidents and other adversaries who made trouble in exile, and who were accused of disrupting the unity of the Tibetans. Some of the more prevalent conflicts which were raised during conversations include: the many so-called ‘Taiwan affairs’ which were related to the Taiwanese Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission;39 the trouble with the 13 settlements;40 the Chushi Gangdruk;41 the violent clashes between the opponents in the conflict concerning the worship of Dorje Shugden;42 and the delicate issue of the recognition of the seventeenth Karmapa.43 Even entire communities have earned the reputation of causing disunity, like the Jorpati camp in Kathmandu, the settlement of Clement Town and the Khampa Camp 4 in Bylakuppe, which were issues raised during conversations with

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Tibetans about the problems of unity versus polyvocality in the simultaneous democracy-building and freedom struggle aspirations. Furthermore, Tibetan intellectuals have also been accused of sowing discord in the community of Tibetan exiles or compromising their credibility. The list includes the historian Dawa Norbu and the writer Jamyang Norbu, who more than once have been vocal about the flaws of the political elite in Dharamsala and its policies. I could add to these old but not forgotten controversies several contemporary and ongoing conflicts. Yet, no matter how many perspectives we gain on these issues, and no matter how many examples we come up with, it usually boils down to one central point: namely, that these controversies are framed within a perceived risk which threatens the establishment and maintenance of unity among Tibetans, which in turn is understood to be an essential element in the struggle for freedom. This emphasis on the importance of unity for the freedom struggle is not unique for the Tibetan case and has been recognised as a common element among exile organisations, as Iwan´ska and Shain have observed.44 Shain noted that an exile movement’s success depends heavily upon the strength and unity of their organisation with a leadership that enjoys massive support. An image of a tight unity may increase the credibility of the Tibetans’ struggle in exile, and in turn generate national and international support for the CTA. The many Tibetans whom I have spoken with who fear a disintegration of their nation while they reside in exile believe that maintaining national unity and loyalty is necessary if they want to survive as one people with a legitimate claim to their homeland Tibet. For these Tibetans, exile is a state of emergency, and this emergency may justify restrictions placed on freedom and rights in order to uphold national unity. Hence, the ideals of unity and loyalty are keys to understanding exile politics, for instance the troubling exclusion and inclusion involved in constructing and maintaining the boundaries of a Tibetan nationin-exile. The CTA has no clear definition of disloyalty, but indicators of disloyal behaviour seem to range from openly criticising or opposing the Dalai Lama, to not paying tax, cooperating with Taiwan’s

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Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (MTAC) and taking host country citizenship. If we for a moment dwell on the latter aspect, that of citizenship, according to Shain, this is an important expression of loyalty. For political exiles, as Shain relates, citizenship is a source of national pride, community and nationalism, a symbol of solidarity and obligation, and the basis for defining national loyalty. Thus, citizenship is also an asset to fight for. My research supports Shain’s findings in that citizenship is connected to concepts of loyalty, but, as I have shown elsewhere, the role of citizenship and its link to loyalty are highly ambiguous.45 For some conservative Tibetans, taking Indian citizenship has been equated with harming the integrity of the freedom struggle and the CTA. Hence, we can at times recognise among some of the statements given by Tibetans the equivalence that Shain has made between citizenship, nationality and belonging, yet among other statements, political allegiance, loyalty and national belonging are not directly connected to citizenship. For these Tibetans, they do not view foreign passports as a proof of lack of commitment to the nation or the freedom struggle. Thus, we can corroborate with Anderson’s discussion of long-distance nationalism, but we have to argue against Shain: the passport in itself says nothing about national loyalty. The CTA cannot force Tibetans to be loyal by threatening with activating enforcement mechanisms, such as a police force, army or prisons, but both the CTA and individual Tibetans do in fact sanction loyalty. Frechette and DeVoe have pointed to how the CTA has deliberately instilled exclusion policies, referring to how it has excluded settlements from CTA affiliation and withdrawn subsidies in order to discourage anti-Dalai Lama actions and make Tibetans comply with Dharamsala policies.46 This was the case, for example, with the 13 settlements,47 the guerrilla fighters in Nepal, and anybody travelling to Taiwan.48 Furthermore, censorship has been a tactic employed by the CTA, and has been debated in Tibetan social media, such as www.phayul.com, the Tibetan Political Review,49 and the influencial blogs by American-based Jamyang Norbu50 and Beijingbased Woeser.51 Woeser pointed at the exiles’ repeated appeals to fellow Tibetans to tone down their disagreement in order to uphold

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unity, and compared this to the authoritarian regime’s need to erase the individual for the benefit of the collective. She explained the importance of the role that criticism and scepticism must play in a democracy, writing how criticising democratically elected leaders and representatives are elementary to democracy, and that ‘suppressing this criticism, regardless of what the motivations or reasons are, the result will always run counter to democracy’.52 What had spurred Woeser’s comment were the public statements of PM Lobsang Sangay and the speaker of the parliament-in-exile Penpa Tsering on Tibetan Democracy Day celebrations on 2 September 2012, which condemned unnamed individuals who were creating divisions among the Tibetan people and hurting the feelings of the Dalai Lama.53 Penpa Tsering had also warned the media not to ‘become a medium to spread discord within the community’.54 Their statements prompted a discussion amongst Tibetans on the issue of the freedom of speech and the role of the CTA in developing democracy and ensuring free speech, but also in being a uniting force in exile. The Tibetan Political Review issued the following advice to the CTA, asking it to commit to free speech by: Ensuring that, in the future, His Holiness’s words are not exploited by powerful individuals to insulate politicians from criticism; Actively combating the chilling effect where Tibetans may fear that they will be wrongfully labelled antiDalai Lama, simply because they disagree with policies of the TGIE leadership; Rescinding the demand that all Members of Parliament must support the administration’s official line; Avoiding further statements that might serve to intimidate the Tibetan media; Withdrawing its claim that the people must ‘accept whatever policies are decided upon by the government.’ We believe that such steps will ensure that the administration’s actions do not – knowingly or unknowingly – harm the democratic principles for which His Holiness and all Tibetans strive.55 We see from the Tibetan Political Review’s suggestions that the Tibetans’ loyalty to the Dalai Lama can be misused and even reverse

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the process of democratisation. Since Tibetan exiles have generally felt the need to secure a unity centred on the Dalai Lama, Tibetans who challenge policies advocated by him have to balance their political activities between proving their loyalty towards the Dalai Lama and voicing alternative opinions. They risk earning the label ‘anti-Dalai Lama’. Actors who have questioned, contradicted or criticised government policies have performed these actions knowing that they might be accused of criticising the Dalai Lama. Those who have been labelled as ‘anti-Dalai Lama’ have not been viewed as people who offer alternative viewpoints in order to enrich debate and reflection, or deepen democracy. Instead, they have been seen as dissidents who were trying to split the exile community and to topple the government and the very freedom movement headed by the Dalai Lama. There have been several wellknown incidents in which Tibetan exiles have taken it upon themselves to define disloyalty and sanction behaviour as anti-Dalai Lama. Take, for example, Tibetan intellectual Jamyang Norbu’s account ‘Opening the Political Eye: Tibet’s Long Search for Democracy’, in which he describes the violent sanctions against Tibetan intellectuals and the TYC during the 1980s who were judged to be anti-Dalai Lama. He commented: ‘All these excessive displays of devotion to the Dalai Lama, of hysterical patriotism and religious fanaticism were actively promoted by the Tibetan government and eagerly taken up by the lumpen element in Tibetan society.’56 Jamyang Norbu had himself experienced this several times, for instance after he established the Amnye Machen Institute in 1992 and issued the bi-monthly newspaper Dmangs gtso (Democracy) together with three other Tibetan intellectuals: Lhasang Tsering, Pema Bhum and Tashi Tsering.57 As I have related in Chapter 3, this Tibetan language magazine educated Tibetans, provided news and views about democracy, presenting their translation of democracy by explaining key features of democracy, which in the opinion of the newspaper, included concepts such as ‘election’ (’os bsdu), ‘secular state’ (’jig rten lugs kyi rgyal khab), ‘multi-party system’ (tshogs pa mang po’i lam lugs), and ‘liberal democracy’ (rang mos dmangs gtso). And from these highlighted

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concepts, we can understand that the translations of democracy which were presented in Dmangs gtso offered an alternative view to the Tibetan model for democracy which had just been outlined in the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile, in which it was stipulated that it was neither a secular nor a party system.58 Moreover, the newspaper offered comments on the exile society and politics, and this, in particular, provoked sections of the exile-Tibetan population to exert considerable pressure and stigmatisation on the Amnye Machen Institute. All the same, even though the paper was widely read and revered among Tibetan exiles, it was also accused of being ‘anti-Dalai Lama’ because of its critical and investigative reports. Jamyang Norbu has related the issue as such: The editors received death threats on a regular basis, and gangs and mobs often poured into our office, scaring the girls at the reception desk and harassing everybody else. All these incidents were clearly organised and instigated by the religious-right coalition in order to shut down the paper.59 The newspaper Dmangs gtso was consequently terminated in 1996, and this was understood to be a tremendous set-back to the process of democracy-building among Tibetan exiles. The Amnye Machen Institute has since decided to change its focus from politics to culture, and Jamyang Norbu is today living ‘in exile from exile’ in the United States. He is the author of the popular blog Shadow Tibet in which he publishes his analysis of historical and contemporary political issues related to Tibet and Tibetan exile.60 Although the ‘anti-Dalai Lama’ label has not silenced Jamyang Norbu, it has been an effective stigma that has transformed critical spokespersons into ‘untouchables’, as the poet and YFBD activist Tenzin Tsundue once called it.61 Several of my interlocutors have pointed out how the anti-Dalai Lama label has limited the extent and the quality of democracy and become an obstacle to establishing ‘true’ democracy. It would be a good thing if Tibetan politics came out from the Dalai Lama’s shadow, Jamyang Norbu suggested in 2002, saying:

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The Dalai Lama’s presence in Tibetan political life is much like the giant banyan tree, under whose shade little can grow. Tibetan ministers give the appearance of being no more than messenger boys, and members of parliament fall over each other in their eagerness to agree with him. The Dalai Lama himself has remarked on the dilemma of his omniscient leadership but has done little to resolve it. But his absence might be just the thing that allows mature democratic institutions to take root. To be sure, without His Holiness’s presence there is danger of dissension within refugee society. But exiled Tibetans already have a half century of experience in the rough-and-tumble of India’s robust democracy. Surely they are ready for their own.62 The official stance called the Middle-Way approach, authored by the Dalai Lama, which placed the emphasis on Sino-Tibetan dialogue and advocated for autonomy rather than independence, has been one such source of tension. Because it has originated from and has been upheld by the Dalai Lama, many impatient and frustrated exiles who do not believe that this is the most appropriate strategy for achieving freedom have felt muted. The disagreement over whether to follow the ‘meaningful autonomy’ line of the Dalai Lama or not has been a contentious issue which spans across generations. Several informants expressed divided feelings. While the TYC officially struggles for independence in Tibet, I met TYC members who personally believed in the Dalai Lama’s more ‘realistic’ strategy to go for autonomy. And while the TWA officially supported the Dalai Lama’s fight for autonomy in Tibet, I met TWA members who secretly longed for independence. For all of these Tibetans I spoke with, it was nevertheless understood to be important to stress that, although their organisations had different perspectives, it was not tantamount to a divided or disunited community. An example that Tibetan exiles often referred to in order to argue that diversity was not the same as a disunited freedom struggle was the Indian independence movement that had been fought with different means, yet in unison, by Mahatma Gandhi and the revolutionaries Bhagat Singh and Subhas Chandra Bose. Invoking the Indian independence movement was a

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common strategy employed to legitimise the importance of diversity among those Tibetan exiles who held alternative viewpoints. Radical exile-Tibetan activists have lamented that the present CTA has limited their actions and polyvocality by binding them to their duty of being loyal towards the CTA and the Dalai Lama. Another solution to this dilemma of polyvocality versus unity has been the attempt to ‘unyoke the political from the religious’ in the sense that some Tibetan exiles have disagreed with the political strategy of the Dalai Lama, but have not challenged his spiritual authority.63 Thus, they have mirrored the Dalai Lama’s own strategy of separating the domains of politics and religion vis-a`-vis his position as supreme leader. While they wish to display their loyalty to the Dalai Lama, through making a distinction between religion and politics they have created a space which allows for what they consider to be a legitimate form of contestation. At the very least, this separation of religion from politics could provide the necessary space for political contestation in that the Tibetan public is able to legitimise what could otherwise be seen as dissidence. In this way, these Tibetan exiles have tried to legitimise acts and statements which could be seen as being in opposition or ‘disobedient’ towards policies advocated by the Dalai Lama. Nonetheless, many exile Tibetans have bound themselves and each other to strict loyalty in order to prevent fragmentation of their exile community and, in some cases, this has become an issue which posits democracy in opposition to unity. For many Tibetans, such self-imposed limitations have been understood to be a temporary necessity due to their political vulnerability in exile. In this manner, a self-imposed censorship or self-limitation when it comes to freedom of speech, polyvocality and the right to disagree has been performed among many Tibetan exiles.

Tibetans at home and abroad unite The biggest obstacle to democracy is exile. Shain, who argued that advancing democracy is a strategy commonly applied by governments-in-exile, did not highlight how democracy itself can cause

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problems for exile movements.64 For example, Tibetan exiles have organised the CTA as a government-in-exile, which has struggled, on the one hand, to mobilise international support, and, on the other hand, to secure internal coherence, unity and loyalty. But democracybuilding has also become caught up in efforts to create an image of strength and to secure organisational unity, undisputed leadership and popular acceptance among Tibetans. While they have strived to become a unified and monolithic force, when democracy has been weighed against the freedom struggle, some Tibetans have evaluated exile temporality versus diasporic permanence, and in this exercise, democracy has often lost. Others have worried that democracybuilding has consumed the Tibetans’ energy and limited resources, or feared that democracy will tear the Tibetans apart because they deemed democracy to be a disuniting force – something that they cannot afford in this state of emergency which is exile. They have perceived loyalty and unity as important in their attempt to represent the interests of a Tibetan national community inside and outside of Tibetan geography, and necessary to protect and preserve the existence of their nation and its integrity. The united freedom struggle, thus, has won over democracy. The Tibetan prime-minister-in-exile, Lobsang Sangay, has highlighted unity as a key concept in his political campaign, as reflected in his slogan ‘principle of unity, innovation, self-reliance’ (chig sgril dang/ gsar gtod/ rang kha rang gso byed rgyu’i lta grub).65 In the campaign that led to his election, he declared his obedience to the Dalai Lama, and he proclaimed his spiritual and political allegiance to the Dalai Lama. In his inaugural speech on 8 August 2011, Lobsang Sangay explained that the Tibetans would be defeated if they did not stand united, and his call for unity has since been repeated.66 When he evaluated his office and the work of his cabinet a year later, again unity was promoted as a key to his success.67 Unity, thus, has been a key concept for the exile leadership, and when I asked several Tibetans about the centrality of unity in political speeches, it became clear that although they saw unity as central to obtaining success in their struggle for freedom, they evaluated the state of unity differently. For instance, several interlocutors related how they

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thought it was immensely important that all Tibetans support the success of Lobsang Sangay’s first term in order to ensure unity, regardless of whether they voted for him or not. Few Tibetans mentioned that their struggle was disunited, but they called for the abolition of regionalism and sectarianism, while at the same time they optimistically looked towards the unity that already was in place, and the connection, real or imagined, between ‘all Tibetans whether at home or abroad’ (gzhis byes bod mi yongs). If we relate to the two exemplary Greek concepts that constitute democracy, i.e. demos and kratos, the demos (people) of the Tibetans’ democracy movement should ideally include both Tibetans residing in Tibet and abroad in exile, and the kratos (rule) should ideally facilitate their reunion in a self-ruled, democratic Tibet.68 It is this strongly felt need for a unified Tibet stretching beyond exile which ties Tibetans within and outside of Tibet, that Shain has called an ‘inside– outside dilemma’.69 Returning to Shain’s comparative work on political exiles, he explained the potential destructive force of the ‘inside–outside dilemma’ of political exiles, which has also been elaborated upon in an exile-Tibetan context by Roemer. One of the most crucial tasks of the Tibetan government-in-exile, according to Roemer, is to bridge the gap between the exiles who are geographically away from the homeland (the outsiders) and those who are living in Tibet (the insiders).70 These two groups are subjected to very different socioeconomic and political circumstances that may influence their sense of belonging, but the union between the two groups is understood to be important for the development of the exile movement and its success. Roemer has found that the Dalai Lama was an ‘unquestioned leader’ and a ‘unifying symbol’, but she gave examples of how he also practically unites Tibetans and makes them overlook their internal divisions.71 In Roemer’s assessment, the Dalai Lama has the ability to ‘smooth over’ whatever gap might appear between insiders and outsiders because of his ‘divine personality’.72 Since Roemer in her book from 2008 substantiated this overall popular narrative that the Dalai Lama is the source of Tibetan unity, recent events taking place inside Tibet have confirmed this strongly felt need among exiles, not only to stand united in exile, but also united across the entire Tibetan

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sphere, especially with those living in Tibet. The issue of the insider–outside dilemma has also been addressed in the many appeals made by Tibetans inside Tibet in their messages that have reached beyond Tibet through popular culture and political protest. We see, for example, strong appeals for Tibetan unity in messages left behind by some of the 142 Tibetans who (at the time of writing, August 2015) have self-immolated since February 2009, the majority of whom were placed in eastern Tibet.73 One oft-cited message has been from Sonam Wangyal, more commonly known under the name of Lama Sobha, who set himself alight on 8 January 2012 in Darlag (Chi.: Dari). He left an audio-recording that was translated and publicised by the International Campaign for Tibet in which the opening statement was a homage to the first act of self-immolation by a Tibetan exile that occurred in New Delhi in 1998, and other Tibetans who had sacrificed their lives: ‘To all the six million Tibetans, including those living in exile – I am grateful to Pawo Thupten Ngodup [. . .] and all other Tibetan heroes, who have sacrificed their lives for Tibet and for the reunification of the Tibetan people.’74 In his message, he also highlighted inside–outside relations and made a call for unity, saying: ‘To all my spiritual brothers and sisters, and the faithful ones living elsewhere: You must unite and work together to build a strong and prosperous Tibetan nation in the future. This is the sole wish of all the Tibetan heroes.’75 Sonam Wangyal refers to those who have immolated as ‘pawo’ (dpa’ bo), meaning ‘hero,’ which is a common reference that is used to ascribe value to these acts as sacrifices for the Tibetan nation. Moreover, we see the importance of insider –outsider unity not only because of his call for a pan-Tibetan unity, but also because he makes a respectful gesture towards the first self-immolation that took place in exile a decade before. Seven self-immolations have taken place in exile, two of which happened in 1998 and 2006, before the spate of self-immolations that took place in Tibet beginning in 2009.76 The other immolations that have taken place in exile could be seen as responses to the self-immolations in Tibet, and as assurances of a panTibetan solidarity and unity that stretches across the Tibetan sphere and transgresses political borders. For instance, we see the impact of

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insider–outsider relations when Jampa Yeshe set himself on fire on 26 March 2012 in New Delhi. The handwritten last words that he left behind in his New Delhi home opened up with the following lines: ‘Long Live His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who is the shining example of world peace. We must strive to ensure return of His Holiness to Tibet. I pray and believe that the Tibetan people in and outside Tibet will be united and sing the Tibetan national anthem in front of the Potala Palace.’77 The same appeals for unity have emerged in a series of songs and music videos produced in the eastern Tibetan regions of Kham and Amdo.78 One of the messages that have become poignant within the context of democracy and unity is a song by Phuljung from Barkham, Sichuan, in which the survival and unity of the Tibetan nation is explicitly linked to democracy and the Dalai Lama. Phuljung released the song ‘Kind Lama’ in 2012, in which he connected and outlined the tripartite union of the Dalai Lama, the prime minister and the Tibetan nation. He sang how the Dalai Lama sits on a golden throne whose role is to protect the people; the political leader sits on a silver throne whose role is to be the mediator of the Tibetan people; and then the people whose role is to keep the nation undamaged and united.79 Warner has studied the trend of singing about a common Tibetan identity, and he identified the semiotic strategies and political potential of the songs and their accompanying music videos on YouTube.80 The shared identity is both religious and ethnic, and is formulated in opposition to the PRC and the Chinese. Warner has explained how they express a pan-Tibetan identity through what he calls ‘uncivil religion’ which is a politicised religiousness. It is uncivil because it rejects the PRC civil religion, and it encompasses the religiousness shared by Tibetans in that they unite in their ‘devotion to the Dalai Lama, emblems of the former Tibetan state, and Tibetan forms of Buddhism’.81 In exile and in the PRC, the lyrical and visual symbolism of these songs are interpreted ‘as a call for Tibetans to return to a shared Tibetan identity, centered around religious piety and implied civil disobedience, in order to counter fears of cultural assimilation’.82 In exile, Tibetans have recognised and felt excited about the timely call for unity emerging from inside Tibet. It has become

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apparent that they view the unity between ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’ as pivotal to their survival as a nation. They have highlighted the importance of these appeals for unity in their own messages, and used them to revive their struggle. Tibetans in exile have grown up with being told that unity is important, but now, as several interlocutors have related, they see unity playing out in front of their own eyes. Of course, the goal of the struggle is, after all, to make the reunion happen in Tibet. Thirty-nine-year-old Tenzin Lhamo, a Lhasa woman who moved to Dharamsala in order to be closer to the Dalai Lama, explained in 2012 how she longed for this reunion between the Dalai Lama and ‘Tibetans at home and abroad’ (gzhis byes bod mi yongs): What is the most important for Tibetan people? The greatest hope is that His Holiness is taken to Tibet, and that there is peace and religious freedom. That is the greatest hope for the Tibetan people staying in Tibet. The greatest hope of Tibetans living in exile is to reunite Tibetans in Tibet and in exile, to take His Holiness to the Potala Palace, and to have religious freedom . . . I also long for this.83 There is thus a strongly felt conviction among many Tibetans that the success of their exile movement largely depends upon their unity. What is interesting is not only the ways in which unity is defined by a common language, celebration of a shared culture, and so forth, as well as under guidance of an overarching religious leader, the Dalai Lama, and a political leader, Lobsang Sangay; it is also interesting that there is this strongly felt need to express this importance in popular culture and in political protest. This expressed importance for unity, moreover, emphasises how Tibetan unity must be a central element in analysing Tibetan exile politics. This striven-for unity, furthermore, has not been limited to the internal unity of the freedom movement in exile, but rather has spanned across the Tibetan plateau to unite every Tibetan – wherever they might be.

POSTSCRIPT

Translations are processes that individuals, groups, and institutions are subjected to, but also projects that they undertake. The translations of democracy, being an inescapable concept containing a plurality of meanings which are crystallised into one single notion (according to Koselleck’s grundbegriffe1), has significant consequences because it enforces translations along many dimensions or layers in society. It defines human nature, organises groups, regulates and educates people. In concrete terms, we can observe that the exileTibetan translation project has particularly wide-reaching social and political consequences for the individuals who must develop a democratic mind; for the institutions which must share positions of power; and for the spiritual leader who had to give up his political office – all of which are manifestations of translation. Translation is universal, democracy is not. Tibetan exiles have had to relate to new knowledge and competing discourses pouring in from every corner of the world. The concepts of democracy, human rights, cultural heritage and environmentalism are phenomena that apparently have assumed the character of being universally applicable and valid. These circulating concepts are, in many cases, principles of the project of modernity that travel the globe, and these global issues have also been translated by the exile elite who have tried to make them relevant and applicable in their own society.2 If we look at how foreign words are introduced to a Tibetan audience, be it human

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rights, culture, democracy, or religion and secularism,3 they remain foreign notions until, after years or even decades of negotiations over translation, they become meaningfully deployed by agents.4 That is not to say that translation now has settled, and therefore is discontinued. Rather, what I have unfolded in this book is that translation no longer is an elite project run by certain power holders who have decided to modernise their society. We can say that translation itself has become democratised. In reality, anybody can take it upon themselves to translate their own personal version of democracy. What is at stake, however, is which version is able to infiltrate the institutions and political culture, to make an impact on the future destiny of Tibetans in exile and in Tibet, and to direct the course of their struggle towards a ‘free Tibet’ – whether this is translated as ‘genuine autonomy’ or ‘independence’. Studies into the Tibetan democratisation process have generally taken a top-down perspective, such as when asserting that the Dalai Lama gave democracy to Tibetans.5 In that sense, the democratisation process among Tibetan exiles in India has been written into the thesis that sees democratic breakthrough as an elite-motivated process (as promoted by O’Donnell et al. in 1986 and their successors).6 Yet, Tibetans do not simply parrot the Dalai Lama’s version of democracy when they imagine and practise democracy in organisations and settlements. Democracy, which the Dalai Lama presented to the Tibetans in the 1960s, was not a readymade and fixed product to be consumed in predefined ways. Instead, Tibetans have translated democracy into a gift of democracy, and it obtained its own life as it was passed on among the Tibetan exiles. Democracy, usually conceptually constructed by Tibetans through its input aspect, namely elections, and for which they have coined the terms dmangs gtso and mang gtso, is imagined differently and negotiated in relation to how traditional Tibetan governance of the past is understood, and in relation to how democracy can be imagined for a free Tibet in the future. As this ‘gift of democracy’ has entered new life phases, different domains of society and new geographical sites, it has also matured, changed character and transformed. The gift of democracy has even assumed a career in the sense that donor and recipients imagine its future in a free Tibet.

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Because translating democracy is an unfinished and open-ended process, I have explored this concept through various deductions into an ongoing process, producing a life story of democracy which is something more than just a neat, chronological narrative or an institutional history. Instead, the focus has been on the multiple relations created between the concept and the people who imagined and used it, and we have followed the multi-layered processes of translation by picking up on the idea of democracy in particular contexts and at specific moments of its life. I selected important aspects and entry points to the life story that together form a coherent narrative by delving into the relations that it has entered at three levels of society (Chapters 1 – 3) and disentangled the frictions that have been created when the concept was negotiated by claimants (Chapters 4– 6). Thus, studying a concept by describing its relations to the people who imagine and use it at different moments of its life, and by documenting how the translations of ideas, people and institutions are tied up with each other, we see that they create meaning and that the meaning changes. I have attempted to unlock the shifting meanings of democracy and show how it does not remain the same throughout its life, but has been reinterpreted, occupied different modes and has been transformed throughout its existence. It is in Tibetan bsgyur ba, ‘translated,’ in the sense of being ‘transformed’ by the people who imagine and use it. These dynamics of translation become most apparent when we observe how the Dalai Lama’s discourse on democracy changes. And furthermore, whenever these discursive changes regarding democracy have occurred, changes could also be observed in the institutional infrastructure and the procedures of the CTA. Democracy has thus been transformed from being a simple, almost passively endured procedure, such as an election of representatives among candidates of the elite, to an increasingly more active participation with a multitude of forms such as organising popular elections at every level of society, deliberating the political position of the Dalai Lama and more recently pre-election campaign trails. In that way, Frechette was accurate in that the gift of democracy has turned into an empowerment of the public.7 However, many Tibetan exiles have been tremendously reluctant to

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accept responsibilities and power at the expense of the Dalai Lama’s power; others have even opposed it. Not everybody has welcomed the gift of democracy. Thus we may say that the concept of democracy has not only changed as it entered different phases of its life, but that it was also received in various ways. There are several reasons why the gift of democracy was received and imagined in different ways. One important aspect is that Tibetans have been integrated into the Indian host community to different degrees; other aspects include having different levels of education, a different embeddedness in tradition and quite divergent experiences of exile and modernity. For some, the gift of democracy has been a blessing from a divine donor, but also, in the worst case, a burden that has been difficult to shake off. In some cases, the gift of democracy was never unwrapped or became part of everyday life in the settlements, but was treated as a sacred thing. People who treated it in this way tended to circumvent democracy as if it was untouchable. Others simply received it as a blessing and reciprocated it by dutifully showing up at elections. Again, other Tibetans perpetuated the gift of democracy after assessing it and even redefining it. Some even suggested that exile organisations dealt with the gift of democracy as if it were a commodity, especially when they examined the fund-seeking activities of these organisations. Finally, a minority of the recipients have made attempts to disenchant the gift by relating to it as if it were a secular phenomenon. In all cases, democracy has been closely identified with the Dalai Lama, but received in different ways. Hence, the approach towards understanding the concept of democracy in the exile-Tibetan context throughout this book has not been to advocate a pre-defined ‘pure democracy’, but rather acknowledges and focuses on the many forms that democracy has taken since it has been translated differently in diverse cultures. What this approach which looks into the emic perspectives of cultural particularities nonetheless has to consider is the question of assessment. If there is no ideal ‘pure’ or ‘original’ democracy but only translated and constructed democracies that have to be understood in their particular, inter alia, historical, cultural and political contexts, then are those who translate the concept of democracy exempted from our evaluations and judgements?

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Democratic appraisal The observation that there are different translations of ‘rule by the people’, different models of democratic organisation and different practical applications of democracy in political reality, has urged Paley to conclude that: ‘while “democracy” may at times seem to be a floating signifier that can be filled with any number of meanings, it is hardly “hyperreal” in the sense of being disconnected from institutional referents’.8 She identified a number of varieties of ‘uses and abuses of “democracy”’ documented in anthropological studies, but she did not problematise the different parameters for evaluating regimes as to whether democracy is realised in institutions, procedures and outcomes. Is it possible and necessary to agree upon a universal checklist for democratic appraisals in foreign contexts? And, if so, who has the right to define these normative appraisals? According to some scholars, countries can be evaluated in terms of how close or how far away they are from transitioning to democracy.9 If we accept that there exist pseudo-democratic forms of democracy, it means that countries can be measured on a scale of more or less democratic, or that it is possible to evaluate the ‘democraticness’ of each of democracy’s components.10 Although graduation is difficult to specify,11 there is a tradition of ranking the extent to which democracy has been instilled in societies by the two guiding principles of popular control and political equality.12 The same scholars admit that although no single set of institutions and rules defines democracy, there is an overall consensus of a ‘procedural minimum’ consisting of secret balloting, universal adult suffrage, regular elections, partisan competition, associational recognition and access, and executive accountability.13 Appraisals which place elections at the very heart of democracy apply Schumpeterian minimalist criteria, in the sense that special attention is given to the input legitimacy of democracy.14 Another common measurement for assessing the extent of democracy implemented, suggested by Held among others are the five criteria employed by Dahl, namely: effective participation, enlightened understanding, voting equality, control of the agenda and inclusiveness by citizenship.15 These

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criteria place the rights, obligations and opportunities of the people at the core of the democratic system. It should be noted, however, that it is possible to argue that democracy has never been realised in any country, and for that reason, some argue, Dahl has chosen to call modern democracy ‘polyarchy’.16 Assessments by Tibetan intellectuals and foreign scholars have been overall sympathetic towards the exile-Tibetan democratisation process in light of the relatively ‘short exposure to modernity’, and by doing this indirectly confirm the Tibetan meta-narrative of democracy as a result of the ‘modern moment’ (see the Introduction). There are several models for appraising the quality or the extent of democracy, depending on which democracy concept the appraisals are based upon. Whether one applies Schumpeterian, Dahlian or other criteria in democratic appraisals has, of course, enormous impact on the conclusions drawn from these. Studies have measured to what extent exile-Tibetan institutions, procedures and political culture are democratic according to Dahlian criteria that place rights, obligations and opportunities of the citizens at the core of democracy.17 Other studies give special attention to the input legitimacy of democracy (such as elections) according to Schumpeterian or ‘minimalist’ criteria.18 Frechette concluded that, according to Schumpeterian criteria, the exile-Tibetan model certainly fulfils minimalist standards of popular vote.19 Nonetheless, when Frechette appraised whether the democratic ideal is consolidated, i.e. routinised and internalised according to the definition proposed by Diamond,20 she concluded that Tibetan democracy is limited. Overall these studies acknowledge that Tibetan exiles certainly are democratising, since democracy at least is the aim of their reforms. They also conclude that the exileTibetan model of democracy fulfils minimalist standards of popular vote, but have nonetheless identified several obstacles to what has been called ‘full democratisation’.21 The greatest obstacle to democratisation has been exile itself since Tibetans are subject to the laws and governments of their host countries. Other obstacles, to mention just a few, are the lack of formal opposition and people’s participation, factionalism, religion’s interference in the sphere of politics, and finally, the undemocratic

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position of the Dalai Lama. It is especially the dual role of the Dalai Lama, as a religious and political authority, which has been analysed in detail and found short of the democracy ideal.22 The overall sympathy towards the Tibetans’ democratic transition has led some to excuse the shortcomings of the exile-Tibetan democratisation process. Frechette, for instance, has called it an ‘experiment’23 and a ‘dress rehearsal’.24 Also, several Tibetan interlocutors have excused the democratic deficit by referring to the democratisation process as an experiment conducted in exile in order to prepare for real implementation in Tibet in the future. In contrast, my own research establishes that the Tibetan exiles’ democratisation process bears the marks of a reform, not only an experiment. Their democratisation efforts have had a major impact on how Tibetans think, organise and imagine Tibetan society. Thus, the act of translating democracy has changed their world in many ways. Therefore, I refrain from reducing the exile-Tibetan version of democracy into a democracy with a qualifying adjective, e.g. ‘pseudodemocracy’ or ‘democracy-lite’, to depict a system of governance that has democratic features, yet not democratic enough to earn the title of democracy without disclaimers. Furthermore, I have argued that it is certain that the exile-Tibetan translations of democracy which have been manifested in institutions, procedures, political culture and discourses are not simply imitations of any prototype or ideal counterpart in Europe or America. Instead, as observed by Kurtz in his study of the naturalisation of an occidental notion in China, the act of translation inevitably contains an element of transformation, and the outcome of the translation process is never exactly the same as whatever is held up as the original.25 It is, of course, naive to believe in the sameness of an original and a translation, since it is impossible to reproduce the original. In the words of Bassnett: ‘There can never be sameness in translation, for as a text moves across languages, so it is decoded and re-encoded, dismembered and re-membered, reshaped and remade into a new original to be read anew.’26 Nevertheless, for most people, an ideal model is held up as the original, and other versions of democracy are therefore seen as ‘divergent refractions’, to quote Lefevere.27 In other words, the different translations become

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divergent when they are received and interpreted against a different background. Democracy, as translated by Tibetan exiles, has been altered and extended into something new that, for many Tibetans, conforms to the universally applicable democracy as a modern form of governance, but nonetheless is Tibetan. The question then becomes whether we can agree upon some baseline democracy model for Tibetan governance to be considered a democracy that at the same time is particularly suited to their needs. As long as the CTA claims to be democratic, Tibetan media, scholars, intellectuals and people in general will appraise it by comparison and criticism. Tibetans whom I have interviewed set up parameters and measured in which respects their own system of government was democratic, and in which respects it had shortcomings. Some interviewees’ parameters resembled Schumpeterian criteria of popular vote, while others applied Dahlian notions of rights and obligations when measuring the democratic quality of their exile organisation.

Democratic deficits My study shows that although Tibetans have received and conceptualised democracy differently, they still give it the status of a gift. Only two Tibetans that I interviewed, Norgye Tashi and Pema Thinley, pointed out the oversimplified and even misleading discourse perceiving democracy as a gift plainly given and received. Pema Thinley, in an editorial in Tibetan Review, ‘The Pitfalls of Gifted Democracy’, also argued that portraying democracy as an ‘unasked for gift’ was a misnomer.28 Ten years later, he referred to the gift narrative and encouraged his readers: ‘let us unpack, rather than place on the altar in its undisturbed sanctity, our gift of democracy to see what is in it for all of us’.29 A similar argument that I heard, was that it is misleading to perceive democracy as a gift because, as the intellectual Norgye Tashi once reminded me in our conversation in 2007, the Dalai Lama faced numerous problems negotiating a democratic system in exile. Democracy was in reality never just given like a gift to the Tibetans. Norgye Tashi exemplified the many discussions among the Tibetan power holders, the revolutionaries,

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the religious groups, and the Ganden Phodrang officials at the beginning of exile who negotiated the kind of polity and politics they could accept. Some were reluctant and even resisted the Dalai Lama’s ideas of democracy. Democracy did not come about easily in the Tibetan diaspora, Norgye Tashi concluded.30 Nonetheless, the narrative of democracy as a gift is dominant among Tibetan exiles in India. Though democracy’s status of a gift has most often been on a representational level only, it has been a narrative that has had major impacts and consequences for practical democratisation. Moreover, the gift status of democracy has been ambiguous. On the one hand, the gift status has been understood as evidence of how the Dalai Lama gave away his own power to the people – truly an act of da¯na. On the other hand, this gift status has also been, in some circumstances, used to explain democratic deficits in the ways in which Tibetans have organised themselves in India. The dominant discourse, claiming that democracy has been a gift from the Dalai Lama, has most often been used as an explanation by my interlocutors for why democracy was at a ‘young stage’ or remains an ‘exercise’ in exile. Whether explained as lack of understanding, lack of people’s participation, lack of political parties, and so forth, democratic appraisals made by Tibetan exiles referred to the gift status as a source for democratic deficits. In short, the gift status has constituted an obstacle for democratisation. Thus, while Tibetans have generally agreed that democracy has been given by the Dalai Lama, some critics say that it has been exactly because democracy was a topdown initiative that the Tibetan masses in effect have not understood democracy and cannot be trusted with responsibilities for it. Some have deemed their fellow exiles as unworthy recipients because they were neither adequately ‘politically enlightened’ nor ‘inclined towards democracy’. Student and activist Pema Gyal told me in 2007: I think probably they don’t understand democracy completely even now because we Tibetan people haven’t strived for democracy. That’s one major aspect of Tibetan democracy: Our democracy is given by the leader. So people do not understand the value of democracy.31

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The most common complaint referred to has been the idea that the recipients of the gift of democracy have been unable to make use of the gift so that it would not remain an abstract word or idea only; it had not been fully implemented, because it was neither asked for nor equally understood. This resembles Godelier’s observation that man cannot recognise himself in sacred gifts.32 In the case of the enchanted gift of democracy, many Tibetan exiles have not been able to recognise themselves as being democracy’s author and maker, but see the Dalai Lama as the creator of democracy and recognise his exalted and divinelike spirit in the gift of democracy. Thus, when 26-year-old Kesang Norbu of the Tibetan Youth Congress, in an interview in 2005, explained democratic deficits by blaming it upon the gift status of democracy, he argued that Tibetans neither had wanted nor fought for democracy. In effect, they were not the creators of democracy, and therefore they were unable to understand the nature of democracy: Though we have a democratic form of government . . . our democracy is something very different from that of other nations. In most democratic nations, big democratic nations, the people really fought in order to get democracy. But in our case, it’s something very different because His Holiness gave democracy to us and people didn’t know how to use it: ‘What is this kind of democracy?’ People have so much faith in His Holiness the Dalai Lama, you know.33 Although the gift status of democracy has probably facilitated the launching of democratisation because the Dalai Lama has legitimised it and people accepted it out of unconditional faith towards him, according to Tibetan critics, the recipients did not understand the nature of democracy, and therefore were unable to be worthy recipients. The above statements represent common appraisals by critical and empowered young Tibetans in India, and show how they explain its deficiencies by pointing to the gift status that democracy has acquired during its life trajectories in India. This argumentation has been presented to me on numerous occasions by critical Tibetans from the north and south of India.

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The cartoon by Losang Gyatso (below) printed in Tibetan Review after the CTA had launched the new democratic Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile that introduced radical democratic reforms is very telling and nicely serves as an illustration of the two comments above. In contrast to democratisation in East Europe, where the people had demanded democracy from their leaders, Tibetan exiles neither understood nor wanted the democracy imposed upon them by their leader. This degrading view of fellow exiles has on many occasions been combined with a call for more awareness and more participation, especially now that Tibetans are becoming increasingly educated and politically enlightened, such as we have seen in Chapter 3 among the efforts among Dharamsala democrats to educate Tibetans about democratic duties and rights, and the vigorous preelection activities during the 2010 and 2011 in Chapter 5. Many Tibetans continue to complain that fellow exiles, even after more than 50 years in India, are still not very informed about democracy. One of these critics, Pema Thinley, the editor of the Tibetan Review, is

Figure P.1 Bottom-up democratisation in East Europe. Top-down democratisation in Dharamsala. The cartoon by Losang Gyatso appeared in the January 1992 issue of the Delhi-based magazine Tibetan Review (p. 11), reprinted courtesy of the editor Pema Thinley.

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in the opinion that the almost sacred status of the gift has made the recipients remain passive, and that the majority of Tibetans are unwilling or unable to explore and appraise their gift. He told me in 2007: The problem with democracy in the exile community is that it is not something introduced out of a demand which arose at the grassroots level. The Dalai Lama felt that if the Tibetan community has to modernise, if Tibetans have to modernise as a nation and a people, there has to be democracy. So he sort of imposed it on the Tibetans, and they don’t know what the hell it is! [Laughs] So every time the Tibetans talk about democracy, they say, ‘It’s very sacred. It’s been given by the Dalai Lama. Very sacred. It’s unique! Nowhere else in the world has democracy been given like it has been given to us!’ [Sarcasm] So, they don’t want to open it, look at it, and point out what is wrong, what is right, what they want, what they don’t want. They don’t want to do that. It’s a gift and a sacred gift.34 Statements like these are far from uncommon among critical voices. The gift status of democracy is often pointed to as a source of flaws within Tibetan democracy, not only due to its unworthy recipients, but also because it is enchanted. Still, many Tibetans are content with simply saying democracy is a gift that they are grateful for, and although democratic deficits also depend upon the gift status, so do democracy’s legitimacy. Democracy has been gift-wrapped and enchanted as a necessary first step to overcome the impediments to modernisation that existed in the form of the massive problems of early exile in the 1960s. Yet, perhaps the time has come to disenchant the gift now that the Dalai Lama has unyoked the political from the religious in his authority and passed on his political office to the parliament-in-exile and the prime-minister-in-exile. The meaning, the perception and the significance of the concept of democracy have been transformed through exchange, circulation, reinterpretation, performance and travel. Knowing this life story of democracy, we can also imagine an idealised life of a concept and

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predict its future life trajectories. The prime indication of disenchantment is the Dalai Lama’s devolution of power in 2011, something that many Tibetan exiles loudly refused, and others silently applauded. What is democracy now that the Dalai Lama has relinquished his ownership of the gift? What is the gift of democracy without its renowned owner? Does the exile-Tibetan democracy need holy legitimacy? There are signs of this questioning among a minority of the Dalai Lama’s followers who are trying to treat the gift of democracy as a secular entity and willing to take the lead in making changes to deepen democracy, pushing for a translation of democracy as disenchanted. For other Tibetans, who are less politically engaged and less vociferous, the latest political developments have not distracted them from the path that they were already walking. The historical transfer of the present and future Dalai Lamas’ political powers to a srid skyong did not change their commitment to the Dalai Lama. Like my friend Tenzin Lhamo, a 39-year-old Lhasa woman residing in Dharamsala who considered herself a traditionalist and a devoted and loyal follower of the Dalai Lama – at least spiritually – also supported the Dalai Lama’s decision to disenchant democracy. She rejoiced the fact that the Dalai Lama would devote all his time to teaching the chos and not engaging in srid. Tenzin Lhamo related in one of our conversations in 2012: His Holiness’s semi-retirement means that if from among the dual responsibility of chos and srid, His Holiness gives the political responsibility [srid kyi ’gan] to the young people who have a modern education during his lifetime, then he can offer guidance on what is right and what is wrong. Thinking that it will be extremely difficult for us to take responsibility only when His Holiness passes away, he has stepped down while he is alive to give young people the opportunity to practise and accumulate experiences. It was a gracious offer by His Holiness, having given it much thought in order to evaluate whether we are able to act even without His Holiness in politics. Now more than a year has passed since His Holiness transferred all

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political power [srid kyi sku dbang tshang ma] to the political leader [srid skyong] of the Tibetan government. For about a year it has been going very well without him in politics . . . So now His Holiness can dedicate his time to the chos worldwide. I pray for the life of His Holiness. For us six million Tibetans, he is the sun in the sky, our parent, our lama, our Buddha. There is nobody else like him. He is the one leading us on the right path. I believe nobody can do his work. I continuously pray for his long life.35 Tenzin Lhamo had no problem with letting a lay Tibetan with a Harvard education handle political leadership. Let the educated srid skyong be a guide on the political path towards democracy, and let the Dalai Lama carry on as the spiritual guide on the path to enlightenment. For Tenzin Lhamo, the Dalai Lama’s spiritual role is more important than his political responsibilities, which now have been transferred to politicians. Politics is something that the educated Tibetans can learn, especially if they are accumulating experience under the guidance of the Dalai Lama. The transference of political powers was therefore timely. The responsibility of chos, on the contrary, is not something that any person can carry. Only the Dalai Lama can be a true spiritual guide.

NOTES

Preface 1. For a detailed account of the methods applied and the challenges encountered during this field research, see Trine Brox, ‘The Enchanted Gift of Democracy: Imagining and Negotiating Democracy in the Tibetan Diaspora’, PhD thesis, University of Copenhagen, 2008, pp. 325– 55. 2. Trine Brox, ‘Democracy in the Words of the Dalai Lama’, The Tibet Journal 33/2 (2008), pp. 65– 90. 3. Trine Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan Way? Contesting Secularisms in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in S. Arslan and P. Schwieger (eds), Tibetan Studies: An Anthology (Anbieter, 2010), pp. 117– 42. 4. Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55 – 74. 5. Trine Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan Demos in Exile’, Citizenship Studies 16/3 – 4 (2012), pp. 451 – 67. 6. Brox, ‘The Enchanted Gift of Democracy’.

Introduction Tibetan Exile, Democracy and Translation 1. The first syllable in the Greek word ‘democracy’, demos, means ‘people’ and has been rendered as dmangs and mang in Tibetan. In the context of this first exercise in democracy, I do not focus on the ‘people’ as a cultural or ethnic group, i.e. ethnos, but as a political collective of Tibetan citizens who are deemed eligible to vote in elections. Both categories, ethnos and demos, are social constructions that have been under continuous negotiation among

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3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

8. 9. 10. 11. 12.

13.

14. 15.

16. 17.

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Tibetan exiles. Of course, as will be made clear through numerous examples in this book, the political definition of the demos that has evolved in the Tibetan exile is also predicated upon an idea of a Tibetan ethnos. The Tibetan term lama (bla ma, meaning ‘superior’), the Indian equivalent being guru, is a title applied to Buddhist teachers, and it designates the spiritual master or monk scholar. John F. Avedon, In Exile from the Land of Snows: The Dalai Lama and Tibet Since the Chinese Conquest (New Delhi, 1997 [1979]), p. 107. English-language interview with Diki Choyang (pseudonym, female 22), Dekyiling, December 2006. Planning Commission, Demographic Survey of Tibetans in Exile 2009 [2009 btsan byol bod mi’i mi ‘bor zhib bsher] (Dharamsala, 2010). In Chapter 2, I deal with the Tibetan school system in India and how Tibetan students are seen as nation builders. Phayul, Relief for Tibetans in India, RC Extension up to 5 Years (2012). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼31252 (accessed 19 August 2015). English-language interview with Pema Thinley (male 44), Delhi, April 2007. Julia Meredith Hess, Immigrant Ambassadors: Citizenship and Belonging in the Tibetan Diaspora (Stanford, 2009). Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’. Ibid. For discussions of the various methods and goals of their political protest, see Jane Ardley, The Tibetan Independence Movement: Political, Religious and Gandhian Perspectives (London, 2002); Robert Barnett, ‘Political Self-Immolation in Tibet: Causes and Influences’, Revue d’Etudes Tibetaines 25 (2012); Trine Brox, ‘“Vi ses i Tihar fængselet!” Ulydighed og patriotisme i Tibetan Youth Congress’, Tibet 24/75 (2009). See also the special issues of Cultural Anthropology, ‘Self-Immolation as Protest in Tibet’ (April 2012), and Revue d’Etudes Tibe´taines, ‘Tibet is Burning. Self-Immolation: Ritual or Political Protest?’ (December 2012). Fiona McConnell, ‘Governmentality to Practise the State? Constructing a Tibetan Population in Exile’, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 30/1 (2011), p. 14. Ibid. See Fiona McConnell, ‘De Facto, Displaced, Tacit: The Sovereign Articulations of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’, Political Geography 28/6 (2009); ‘Governmentality to Practise?’; and ‘A State within the State? Exploring Relations between the Indian State and the Tibetan Community and Government-in-Exile’, Contemporary South Asia 19/3 (2011), pp. 297 – 313. Ann Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal: The Dynamics of International Assistance among a Community in Exile (New York, 2002). Phayul, Tibetan Parliament Amends Charter for Dalai Lama’s Devolution of Power (2011). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/tools/print.aspx?id¼ 29582&t ¼1 (accessed 19 August 2015).

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18. Michael Reisman, ‘Governments-in-Exile: Notes Toward a Theory of Formation and Operation’, in Y. Shain (ed.), Governments-in-Exile in Contemporary World Politics (New York, 1991), pp. 238– 48. 19. Tibetan Youth Conference, Respecting and Recognizing the Tibetan Government and Sustaining the Hope Alive (2011). Available at http://www.rangzen.net/2011/ 06/07/respecting-and-recognizing-the-tibetan-government-and-sustainingthe-hope-alive/ (accessed 19 August 2015). 20. Sherab Woeser, Obituary – The Ganden Phodrang Chogley Namgyal Government of Tibet: The Demise of a Government in Exile (2011). Available at http://www. phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼29647&t ¼ 1 (accessed 19 August 2015), no pagination. 21. Jamyang Norbu, Ending to Begin (part I) (2011). Available at http://www. jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2011/07/14/ending-to-begin-part-i/ (accessed 22 August 2015), no pagination. See also Tibetan Political Review, The Shape of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile After the Dalai Lama’s Devolution of Power (2011). Available at http://www.tibetanpoliticalreview.org/articles/theshape ofthetibetangovernment-in-exileafterthedalailama%E2%80%99sdevolution ofpower (accessed 19 August 2015). 22. Jamyang Norbu, Ending to Begin (part I), no pagination. 23. Kelsang Gyaltsen, The Legitimacy and Role of the Central Tibetan Administration (2011). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼ 29660& t¼1&c¼4 (accessed 19 August 2015). 24. Tibetan Political Review, TPR Interview with Samdhong Rinpoche Addresses Devolution, Name Change, Middle Way, and Indian Citizenship (2011). Available at https://sites.google.com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/articles/tprinterview withsamdhongrinpocheaddressesdevolutionnamechangemiddlewayand indiancitizenship (accessed 19 August 2015). 25. See for instance the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile’s preamble: Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ sngon gleng/ (2011). Available at http://bod.asia/about-cta/ /2/ (accessed 19 August 2015); and Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas skabs bcu bzhi pa’i bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs dus bcu gcig pa’i thog stsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin/’, Shes bya 3 (2011), pp. 18–21. 26. See Stephanie Roemer, The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large (New York, 2008) for an institutional history of the CTA in detail. 27. Yossi Shain, ‘Governments-in-Exile and International Legitimation’, Governments-in-Exile in Contemporary World Politics (New York, 1991), p. 219. 28. Ibid., p. 223. 29. Ibid., pp. 224 – 5. 30. Ibid., p. 230. 31. Ibid., p. 223. 32. For details on international assistance to Tibetan exiles, see Dorsh Marie DeVoe, ‘Survival of a Refugee Culture: The Longterm Gift Exchange Between Tibetans Refugees and Donors in India’, PhD Thesis, University of California,

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36.

37. 38.

39.

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1983; Ann Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal: The Dynamics of International Assistance among a Community in Exile; and Hess, Immigrant Ambassadors. Interesting to note is the way in which operational support received from the CIA until the Dalai Lama terminated the relationship in 1974 has also included arms and training for the Nepal-based guerrilla movement which has recruited members from among Tibetan exiles. See Avedon, In Exile, ch. 5; John Kenneth Knaus, Orphans of the Cold War: America and the Tibetan Struggle for Survival (New York, 1999); and Carole McGranahan, Arrested Histories: Tibet, the CIA, and Memories of a Forgotten War (Durham, 2010) regarding the CIA’s involvement in the Tibetan freedom struggle. Refer also to Roemer, Tibetan Government, for discussions on the multiple stakeholders and agents among whom the exile-Tibetan movement has been dependent upon, and McConnell, ‘A State within’, for a discussion of CTA’s relations to the Indian State. Yossi Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty: Political Exiles in the Age of the Nation-State (Middletown, 1989), p. 15. Alicja Iwan´ska, Exiled Governments: Spanish and Polish (Cambridge, 1981), p. 43. Timm Lau, ‘A Diaspora Concept that Works: Tibetan Economy and Identity in India and Canada’, in A. Quayson and G. Daswani (eds), A Companion to Diaspora and Transnationalism (Chichester, 2013), pp. 33 – 45. See Dibyesh Anand, ‘A Contemporary Story of “Diaspora”: The Tibetan Version’, Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies 12/2 (2003); Steven Venturino, ‘Reading Negotiations in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in F.J. Korom (ed.), Constructing Tibetan Culture: Contemporary Perspectives (Quebec, 1997); and Axel Kristian Stro¨m, ‘Between Tibet and the West: On Traditionality, Modernity and the Development of Monastic Institutions in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in F.J. Korom (ed.), Tibetan Culture in the Diaspora: Graz 1995 (Wien, 1997). Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (2011). Available at http://bod.asia/about-cta/ / (accessed 13 March 2016). For an introduction to the green book, consult the CTA (http://tibet.net/s upport-tibet/pay-green-book/) and IRBC, China: The ‘Green Book’ Issued to Tibetans; How it is Obtained and Maintained, and Whether Holders Enjoy Rights Equivalent to Indian Citizenship (2006). Available at http://www.unhcr.org/ refworld/docid/45f1470c2.html (accessed 22 August 2015). See also Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’, for a discussion of the definition of Tibetan demos and citizenship, which according to the exile Tibetans’ charter may be granted to persons whose biological mother or father is of Tibetan descent, and persons married to a Tibetan national for more than three years. See Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (Dharamsala, 2005), pp. 2–3. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London, 1983).

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40. Non-Tibetan supporters can show their loyalty by applying for a ‘blue book’. The CTA launched in 1996 a project called Tibetan Solidarity Partnership in which ‘Friends of Tibet’ can show solidarity in a similar fashion to the Tibetans: ‘Your generosity will be recorded across time by placing colourful stamps bearing the picture of different ancient Tibetan heritage affixed on the book to the value of your donation’ as the CTA advertises on its home page: see CTA, Be a Friend of Tibet. Get Your Blue Book Today! (2015). Available at http:// tibet.net/support-tibet/friends-of-tibet/ (accessed 19 August 2015). 41. Shain, Frontier of Loyalty, p. 61. 42. Michael Billig, Banal Nationalism (London, 1995); see also Dibyesh Anand, Tibet: A Victim of Geopolitics (New Delhi, 2009 [2007]), ch. 6. 43. L.P. Hartley, The Go-between (London, 1974 [1958]), p. 9. Cf. Salman Rushdie, ‘Imaginary Homelands’, Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981– 1991 (London, 1991), pp. 9 –21. 44. Anand has in that regard noticed how commercial establishments in Dharamsala frequently take ‘orientalist names’ (e.g. Shangri-La), while institutions typically take names that ‘reflect a desire to re-create a familiar environment’ (e.g. Amnye Machen). See Anand, Tibet: A Victim, p. 120. 45. Robert Barnett, ‘“Violated Specialness”. Western Political Representations of Tibet’, in T. Dodin and H. Ra¨ther (eds), Imagining Tibet: Perceptions, Projections, & Fantasies (Boston, 2001). 46. Trine Brox, ‘Tibetan Culture as Battlefield: How the Term “Tibetan Culture” is Utilized as a Political Strategy’, in L. Schmithausen (ed.), Buddhismus in Geschichte und Gegenwart: Gewalt und Gewaltlosigkeit im Buddhismus (Hamburg, 2006). 47. Peter Bishop, The Myth of Shangri-La: Tibet, Travel Writing and the Western Creation of Sacred Landscape (London, 1989); Donald S. Lopez, Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West (Chicago, 1998); Martin Brauen, Dreamworld Tibet: Western Illusions (Bangkok, 2004). 48. See for example: Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, The Development of Tibetan Culture: White Paper (Beijing, 2000); Wang Jiawei and Nyima Gyaincain, ‘Tibet Institutes Regional National Autonomy and Needs No “Self-Determination”’, The Historical Status of China’s Tibet, 1997). 49. See for instance the dictionary entry in Melvyn C. Goldstein, The New Tibetan – English Dictionary of Modern Tibetan (Berkeley, 2001), in which chos is glossed ‘religion’ and ‘dharma’, which is the original Sanskrit form. For an introduction to the concept of dharma see Charles Willemen, ‘Dharma and Dharmas’, in R.E. Buswell Jr (ed.), Encyclopedia of Buddhism (New York, 2003). Additionally, I will discuss this terminology in a later section of this chapter, and I deal with it in detail in Chapter 4. See also Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political’ and ‘Changing the Tibetan Way? Contesting Secularisms in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in S. Arslan and P. Schwieger (eds), Tibetan Studies: An Anthology (Anbieter, 2010), pp. 117–42.

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50. The link between Buddhism and Tibetan nationalism has been discussed in Dawa Norbu, ‘“Otherness” and the Modern Tibetan Identity’, Himal May/June (1992); Georges Dreyfus, ‘Proto-Nationalism in Tibet’, in P. Kværne (ed.), Tibetan Studies: Proceedings of the 6th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Fagernes 1992 (Oslo, 1994); and A˚shild Kola˚s, ‘Tibetan Nationalism: The Politics of Religion’, Journal of Peace Research 33/1 (1996), among others. The issue of chos in modern politics is also discussed further in Chapter 4 of this book. 51. In her study on the politics of culture in Dharamsala, Diehl has related Tibetan musical expressions in exile to ideas about identity and tradition versus modernity. She has also unfolded the challenges posed by a complex web of social forces that influence the experiences of exiles and that enable and limit the register within which it is possible to represent Tibetan culture. Diehl has shown how Tibetan culture in exile is constantly flooded by ‘foreign’ and ‘Tibetan’ cultural influences, with the result that there is a multiplicity of different expressions of what Tibetan culture might entail. See Keila Diehl, Echoes from Dharamsala: Music in the Life of a Tibetan Refugee Community (Berkeley, 2002). 52. Venturino, ‘Reading Negotiations’, p. 99, italics in the original. 53. Parliament Proceedings, Bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs/ bdun re’i gros tshogs gsar shog/ (Vol. 1 [19, 27 July]) (Dharamsala, 1994), pp. 2 – 3. 54. Arjun Appadurai, Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization (Minneapolis, 2003 [1996]), p. 3. 55. Girija Saklani, The Uprooted Tibetans in India: A Sociological Study of Continuity and Change (New Delhi, 1984). 56. Ibid., p. 5. 57. Ibid., p. 7. 58. Reinhardt Koselleck, Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time (New York, 2004). 59. Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity (Stanford, 2003), p. 13. 60. Aihwa Ong, Flexible Citizenship: The Cultural Logics of Transnationality (Durham, 1999), p. 31. 61. Bryan S. Turner, Religion and Modern Society: Citizenship, Secularisation and the State (Cambridge, 2011), p. 11. 62. Ibid. and Asad, Formations of the Secular. 63. Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Mineola, 2003 [1930]). 64. Craig J. Calhoun, Mark Juergensmeyer, and Jonathan VanAntwerpen (eds), Rethinking Secularism (New York, 2011), p. 4. 65. Jose´ Casanova, ‘Secularization Revisited: A Reply to Talal Asad’, in D. Scott and C. Hirschkind (eds), Powers of the Secular Modern: Talal Asad and His Interlocutors (Stanford, 2006), pp. 12– 13.

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66. Charles Taylor, ‘Modes of Secularism’, in R. Bhargava (ed.), Secularism and Its Critics (New Delhi, 2006 [1998]); Charles Taylor, ‘Western Secularity’, in C.J. Calhoun, M. Juergensmeyer, and J. VanAntwerpen (eds), Rethinking Secularism (New York, 2011), p. 38. 67. Ibid. 68. Asad, Formations of the Secular. 69. Calhoun, Rethinking Secularism, p. 70ff. 70. Calhoun, Rethinking Secularism. 71. Ibid., pp. 6 –7. 72. Ibid., p. 8. 73. Jose´ Casanova, ‘The Secular, Secularitizations, Secularisms’, in C.J. Calhoun, M. Juergensmeyer, and J. VanAntwerpen (eds), Rethinking Secularism (New York, 2011), p. 59. 74. Asad, Formations of the Secular, p. 1. 75. Peter L. Berger, ‘From Secularity to World Religions: How My Mind Has Changed’, Christian Century 97/2 (1980). 76. Nils Bubandt and Martijn van Beek, Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), p. 6. 77. Asad, Formations of the Secular. 78. For secularism in a Tibetan context, see: Trine Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan Way? Contesting Secularisms in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in S. Arslan and P. Schwieger (eds), Tibetan Studies: An Anthology (Anbieter, 2010); as well as ‘Unyoking the Political’; in an Asian context: Bubandt and van Beek, ‘Varieties of Secularism’; and beyond: Calhoun, Rethinking Secularism; Turner, Religion and Modern; and Asad, Formations of the Secular. 79. Asad, Formations of the Secular. 80. Ong, Flexible Citizenship, p. 53. 81. See ibid.; S.N. Eisenstadt, ‘Multiple Modernities in an Age of Globalization’, Canadian Journal of Sociology 24/2 (1999); Bjørn Thomassen, ‘Anthropology, Multiple Modernities and the Axial Age Debate’, Anthropological Theory 10/4 (2010); Robert W. Hefner, ‘Multiple Modernities: Christianity, Islam and Hinduism in a Globalizing Age’, Annual Review of Anthropology 27 (1998); and Appadurai, Modernity at Large. 82. Ong, Flexible Citizenship, p. 31. 83. Ibid., p. 29. 84. Anthony Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age (Cambridge, 1991). 85. English-language interview with Sangye Tendar (pseudonym, male 24), Bangalore, January 2007. 86. Ong, Flexible Citizenship, p. 36. 87. Appadurai, Modernity at Large, p. 3. 88. Amartya Sen, ‘Democracy as a Universal Value’, Journal of Democracy 10/3 (1999), p. 4; ibid., p. 4.

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89. David Beetham, Democracy: A Beginner’s Guide (Oxford, 2005), p. 3. 90. David Held, Models of Democracy (Cambridge, 2003), p. 120. 91. David Beetham, ‘Liberal Democracy and the Limits of Democratization’, in D. Held (ed.), Prospects for Democracy: North, South, East, West (Cambridge 1993), p. 57. 92. Eva Sørensen, ‘Democratic Theory and Network Governance’, Administrative Theory and Praxis 24/4 (2002), p. 695. 93. James Bohman, ‘From Demos to Demoi: Democracy Across Borders’, Ratio Juris 18/3 (2005). 94. Andrew Heywood, Politics (Basingstoke, 2002 [1997]), p. 69. 95. Beetham, Democracy: A Beginner, p. 3. 96. Held has argued that models of democracy can be built upon two overall categories of democracy; (1) direct or participatory democracy in which citizens are directly involved; and (2) liberal or representative democracy in which elected officers represent the citizens’ interests. See Held, Models of Democracy; Andrew Heywood, Politics, p. 70. The liberal democracy model has been predominant in the West and has been exported beyond. This is also the ideal that the Dalai Lama and the CTA have been advocating. 97. This list is generated from the introductions by Beetham, Democracy: A Beginner, p. 6ff, Robert A. Dahl, Democracy and Its Critics (New Haven, 1989), p. 221ff, and Held, Models of Democracy, p. 120. 98. See Thomas Carothers, Aiding Democracy Abroad: The Learning Curve (Washington, 1999); Carl Gershman and Michael Allen, ‘The Assault on Democracy Assistance’, Journal of Democracy 17/2 (2006); Thomas Carothers, ‘A Quarter-Century of Promoting Democracy’, Journal of Democracy 18/4 (2007). An example of a US government-funded but privately run international democracy promoter is National Endowment for Democracy (hereafter NED), an example of a government agency is the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and the European Union and United Nations are international and multilateral institutions promoting democracy globally. Since 1960, USAID – the biggest promoter and sponsor of democracy internationally – has financed the Tibetan government-in-exile. NED and the German-based Friedrich Naumann Stiftung and Heinrich Bo¨ll Stiftung are other important promoters of liberal democracy in the Tibetan exile. 99. Carl Gershman and Michael Allen, ‘The Assault on Democracy Assistance’, p. 37. 100. Ibid.; Thomas Carothers, ‘The Backlash Against Democracy Promotion’, Foreign Affairs 85/2 (2006). 101. Larry Diamond, in: T. Carothers, ‘A Quarter-Century of Promoting Democracy’, p. 118. 102. Beetham, Democracy, p. 1. 103. Edward Friedman, ‘Introduction’, in E. Friedman (ed.), The Politics of Democratization: Generalizing East Asian Experiences (Boulder, 1994), p. 1.

NOTES TO PAGES 28 –31 104. 105. 106. 107.

108.

109.

110. 111. 112.

113. 114. 115.

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Francis Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man (London, 1992), p. 279. Sen, ‘Democracy as a Universal’, p. 4. Held, Models of Democracy, p. 291, n. 4. The Economist Intelligence Unit has assessed the state of democracy in 2007, 2008, and every year since 2010. These assessments are based on 60 indicators measuring the electoral process and pluralism, civil liberties, functioning of government, political participation and political culture. The 2014 score was lower than previous years and, according to the index, testifies to the erosion of democracy in many places. One example of regression is Thailand, which was downgraded from a ‘flawed democracy’ to a ‘hybrid regime’. Conversely, Tunisia is an example of progression: it was upgraded from ‘authoritarian’ to ‘hybrid regime’ in 2010, and in 2014 to a ‘flawed democracy’. On a number of measures, Asia performed collectively better that other regions: ‘the largest annual improvement in its average score (from 5.61 to 5.70), the greatest number of countries improving their score (13) and the smallest number of countries registering a decline in their score (4).’ The Economist, Democracy Index 2014: Democracy and its Discontents (2015). Available at http://www.sudestada.com.uy/Content/Articles/421a313ad58f-462e-9b24-2504a37f6b56/Democracy-index-2014.pdf (accessed 12 August 2015), p. 16. Cf. The Economist, The Democracy Index 2011: Democracy under Stress (2011). Available at http://www.eiu.com//public/ topical_report.aspx?campaignid¼ DemocracyIndex2011 (accessed 19 August 2015). Kees van Kersbergen and Frans van Waarden, ‘“Governance” as a Bridge between Disciplines: Cross-Disciplinary Inspiration Regarding Shifts in Governance and Problems of Governability, Accountability and Legitimacy’, European Journal of Political Research 43/2 (2004), pp. 156, 158 – 9. Guillermo O’Donnell and Philippe C. Schmitter (eds), Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies (Baltimore, 1986), p. 8. Yossi Shain and Juan J. Linz (eds), Between States: Interim Governments and Democratic Transitions (Cambridge, 1995), p. 7. Heywood, Politics, p. 81. This is advocated by several scholars. See for example: Larry Diamond, Universal Democracy? (2003). Available at http://www.hoover.org/research/ universal-democracy (accessed 19 August 2015); Larry Diamond, Juan J. Linz, and Seymour Martin Lipset (eds), Democracy in Developing Countries: Asia (Boulder, 1989); Friedman, Politics of Democratization; O’Donnell et al., Transitions: Prospects; Miche´le Schmiegelow (ed.), Democracy in Asia (New York, 1997); as well as Shain and Linz, Between States, among others. Samuel P. Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman, 1991). Larry Diamond, Developing Democracy: Toward Consolidation (Baltimore, 1999). Ibid.

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116. Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (London, 2002 [1996]), p. 195. 117. Larry Diamond, ‘The Coming Wave’, Journal of Democracy 23/1 (2012), p. 11. For a discussion about incremental democracy in China, see Keping Yu, ‘Toward an Incremental Democracy and Governance: Chinese Theories and Assessment Criteria’, New Political Science 24/2 (2002). 118. O’Donnell and Schmitter, Transitions: Tentative Conclusions; Guillermo O’Donnell and Philippe C. Schmitter, ‘Defining Some Concepts (and Exposing Some Assumptions)’, Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies (Baltimore, 1986); Guillermo O’Donnell, Philippe C. Schmitter, and Laurence Whitehead (eds), Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Prospects for Democracy (Baltimore, 1986); Guillermo O’Donnell, Philippe C. Schmitter, and Laurence Whitehead (eds), Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Comparative Perspectives (Baltimore, 1986). 119. Examples include Zehra F. Arat, Democracy and Human Rights in Developing Countries (Boulder, 1991); Kenneth E. Bauzon (ed.), Development and Democratization in the Third World: Myth, Hopes, and Realities (Washington, 1992); Diamond et al., Democracy in Developing; Larry Diamond, Juan J. Linz, and Seymour Martin Lipset (eds), Politics in Developing Countries: Comparing Experiences with Democracy (Boulder, 1995); Jeff Haynes, Democracy in the Developing World: Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East (Cambridge, 2001); and Lars Rudebeck and Olle To¨rnquist (eds), Democratization in the Third World: Concrete Cases in Comparative and Theoretical Perspective (London, 1998). 120. Among these are Diamond et al., Democracy in Developing; Friedman, Politics of Democratization; and Miche´le Schmiegelow (ed.), Democracy in Asia. 121. Four contributors defended ‘transistology’ from its sole critic, namely: Thomas Carothers, ‘The End of the Transition Paradigm’, Journal of Democracy 13/1 (2002) and ‘A Reply to my Critics’, Journal of Democracy 13/3 (2002). The defence consisted of Gerald Hyman, ‘Tilting at Straw Men’, Journal of Democracy 13/3 (2002); Ghia Nodia, ‘The Democratic Path’, Journal of Democracy 13/3 (2002); Guillermo O’Donnell, ‘In Partial Defense of an Evanescent “Paradigm”’, Journal of Democracy 13/3 (2002); Kenneth Wollack, ‘Retaining the Human Dimension’, Journal of Democracy 13/3 (2002). 122. Carothers, ‘End of the Transition’, p. 6. 123. Carothers, ‘End of the Transition’, ‘A Reply’; Gerald W. Creed, Domesticating Revolution: From Socialist Reform to Ambivalent Transition in a Bulgarian Village (Pennsylvania, 1998) and Nodia ‘The Democratic Path’ are among those who have argued this. 124. Creed, Domesticating Revolution, p. xv. 125. Carothers, ‘End of the Transition’, p. 9. 126. Ibid., p. 10. 127. David Collier and Steven Levitsky, ‘Democracy with Adjectives: Conceptual Innovation in Comparative Research’, World Politics 49/3 (1997), pp. 430 – 51.

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309

128. O’Donnell, ‘In Partial Defense’. 129. Larry Diamond, ‘Thinking About Hybrid Regimes’, Journal of Democracy 13/2 (2002), p. 24. 130. Justus Mugaju and J. Oloka-Onyango (eds), No-Party Democracy in Uganda: Myths and Realities (Kampala, 2000); John-Jean Barya, ‘International Support to “No-Party” Democracy in Uganda’, in J. de Zeeuw and K. Kumar (eds), Promoting Democracy in Postconflict Societies (Boulder, 2006). 131. David Potter, ‘Democratization in Asia’, in D. Held (ed.), Prospects for Democracy: North, South, East, West (Cambridge 1993), pp. 361 – 2. 132. Ibid. 133. The Economist, Democracy Index 2014. 134. Jørgen Møller and Svend-Erik Skaaning, ‘Regime Types and Democratic Sequencing’, Journal of Democracy 24/1 (2013), pp. 142 – 55. 135. Miche´ le Schmiegelow, ‘The Meaning of Democracy in Asia’, in M. Schmiegelow (ed.), Democracy in Asia (New York, 1997), p. 37. 136. The main democratic institutions in India are modern ‘colonial transplants’, in the terminology of Subrata K. Mitra, ‘Politics in India’, in G.A. Almond et al. (eds), Comparative Politics Today (New York, 2006), p. 635. It refers to how India has adopted a federal parliamentary system of liberal democracy that drew upon the Westminster model, i.e. ‘a system of government in which the executive is drawn from, and in theory accountable to, the assembly or parliament’ explained by Heywood, Politics, p. 33. The president (‘designed with the British monarch in view’: Mitra, ‘Politics in India’, p. 654) has formal executive power, while the prime minister heads the council of ministers. The parliament of India has a Lower House, Lok Sabha, inspired by the British House of Commons. Being a federation, the Upper House is called the Rajya Sabha, meaning ‘council of states’. Seats in the parliament are reserved for scheduled tribes, dalits (untouchables), or scheduled castes. Although there are several political parties, a dominant-party system (not to be confused with a one-party system like that in China) has ruled since its independence in 1947. It is the Congress Party (founded in 1885) that overall has enjoyed a secure majority in parliament. See Heywood, Politics, p. 262. 137. Ramachandra Guha, India after Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy (New York, 2007). 138. Schmiegelow, ‘Meaning of Democracy’, p. 34. 139. Potter, ‘Democratization in Asia’, p. 371. 140. Diamond, ‘Thinking About Hybrid’, p. 28. 141. Potter, ‘Democratization in Asia’, p. 371. 142. Mitra, ‘Politics in India’ and Martha C. Nussbaum, The Clash Within: Democracy, Religious Violence, and India’s Future (Cambridge, 2007) are among those who identify the rise of Hindu nationalism as a proof of a democratic deficit in India. 143. Thomas Blom Hansen, The Saffron Wave: Democracy and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India (New Delhi, 2001 [1999]), pp. 5 – 6.

310

NOTES TO PAGES 36 –39

144. Hansen, Saffron Wave, p. 9. 145. Carothers, ‘End of the Transition’, p. 8. Among those who have discussed democracy in relation to Asian values are: Huntington, Clash of Civilizations; Kim Dae Jung, ‘Is Culture Destiny? The Myth of Asia’s Anti-Democratic Values’, Foreign Affairs November/December (1994), pp. 189 – 94; Lucian W. Pye, Asian Power and Politics: The Cultural Dimensions of Authority (Cambridge, 1985); Lucian W. Pye, ‘“Asian Values”: From Dynamos to Dominos’, in L.E. Harrison and S.P. Huntington (eds), Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress (New York, 2000); Amartya Sen, ‘Human Rights and Asian Values: What Lee Kuan Yew and Le Peng Don’t Understand about Asia’, The New Republic 217/2 – 3 (1997); Sen, ‘Democracy as a Universal Value’; Howard J. Wiarda, Civil Society: The American Model and Third World Development (Boulder, 2003); and Fareed Zakaria, ‘Culture is Destiny: A Conversation with Lee Kuan Yew’, Foreign Affairs 73/2, March/April (1994). For studies on democracy in Asia as compatible with Asian cultures, see Friedman, Politics of Democratization; Jung, ‘Is Culture Destiny?’; W. Sachsenro¨der and U.E. Frings (eds), Political Party Systems and Democratic Development in East and Southeast Asia (Aldershot, 1998); and Schmiegelow, Democracy in Asia. 146. Also, politicians in authoritarian societies, e.g. the former prime minister in Singapore and current minister mentor Lee Kuan Yew have argued for a distinguished cultural relativism in Asia in order to legitimise polities and deny citizens democracy or human rights, since they are seen as products of the West. See Zakaria, ‘Culture Is Destiny’; and Mark R. Thompson, ‘Whatever Happened to “Asian Values”?’, Journal of Democracy 12/4 (2001) for an introduction. 147. See for instance Huntington, Clash of Civilizations; Pye, Asian Power; Pye, ‘“Asian Values”; and Wiarda, Civil Society. 148. Wiarda, Civil Society, p. 70. 149. Julia Paley, ‘Toward an Anthropology of Democracy’, Annual Review of Anthropology 31 (2002), pp. 469– 96. 150. Paley, ‘Toward an Anthropology’, p. 470. 151. For a very good introduction to translation studies see Susan Bassnett, Translation (London, 2014). 152. See Melvin Richter, ‘More than a Two-way Traffic: Analyzing, Translating, and Comparing Political Concepts from Other Cultures’, Contributions to the History of Concepts 1/1 (2005); and Reinhardt Koselleck, ‘A Response to Comments on the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe’, in H. Lehmann and M. Richter (eds), The Meaning of Historical Terms and Concepts: New Studies on Besgrieffsgeschichte (Washington, 1996). 153. Richter, ‘More than a Two-way’. 154. Bassnett, Translation; and Bella Brodzki, Can These Bones Live? Translation, Survival, and Cultural Memory (Stanford, 2007).

NOTES

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311

155. Eliot Weinberger, Anonymous Sources: A Talk on Translators and Translation (2000). Available at http://www.iadb.org/exr/cultural/documents/encuentros/ 39.pdf (accessed 19 August 2015), p. 8. 156. Brodzki, Can These Bones Live?, p. 4. 157. Douglas Howland, ‘The Predicament of Ideas in Culture: Translation and Historiography’, History and Theory 42/1 (2003). 158. Useful discussions of the term ‘cultural translation’ include Denise Gimpel and Kirsten Thisted, ‘Lost – and gained – in translation: Kulturel oversættelse som transformativt rum’, Antropologi 56 (2007) and the discussions appearing in Translation Studies in 2009– 10: Mary Louise Pratt et al., ‘Translation Studies Forum: Cultural Translation’, Translation Studies 3/1 (2010); Boris Buden et al., ‘Cultural Translation: An Introduction to the Problem, and Responses’, Translation Studies 2/2 (2009); Kien Nghi Ha, Lieven D’hulst, and Robert J.C. Young, ‘Translation Studies Forum: Cultural Translation’, Translation Studies 3/3 (2010). 159. Jan-Ulrich Sobisch, Three-Vow Theories in Tibetan Buddhism: A Comparative Study of Major Traditions from the Twelfth through Nineteenth Centuries (Wiesbaden, 2002), p. 40. 160. For an introduction to the demise of the Jonang tradition during the reign of the Fifth Dalai Lama and its present eastern Tibetan revival, see Andreas Gruschke, ‘Der Jonang-orden: Gru¨nde fu¨r seinen niedergang, voraussetzungen fu¨r das u¨berdauern und aktuelle lage’, in H. Blezer (ed.), Tibet, Past and Present: Tibetan Studies I (Proceedings of the Ninth Seminar of The IATS, 2000) (Leiden, 2002) and Tibetan-language discussion at Voice of America, Jonang: The Return of a Tibetan Religious Sect (2013). Available at http://www. voatibetanenglish.com/media/video/1585062.html (accessed 19 August 2015). Being recognised as a separate Buddhist school has also meant that the Jonang has sought representation in the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, which until now has been unsuccessful. Cf. Hill Post, Jonang Buddhists Seek Representation in Tibetan Parliament in Exile (2013). Available at http://hillpost. in/2013/04/jonang-buddhists-seek-representation-in-tibetan-parliament-inexile/67946/ (accessed 19 August 2015) and Phayul, Buddhist Conference Confirms Jonang as a Separate School (2011). Available at http://www.phayul. com/news/article.aspx?id¼30077 (accessed 19 August 2015). 161. Frederic C. Schaffer, Democracy in Translation: Understanding Politics in an Unfamiliar Culture (Ithaca, 1998). 162. Schaffer, Democracy in Translation, p. 9. 163. Schaffer, Democracy in Translation, p. 14. 164. Cf. Young in Kien Nghi Ha, ‘Translation Studies Forum’. 165. Gimpel and Thisted, ‘Lost – and Gained’. 166. Brodzki, Can These Bones Live?, p. 4. 167. Many scholars have made the point that translation is a multi-layered process, see: Joachim Kurtz, ‘Coming to Terms with Logic: The Naturalization of an Occidental Notion in China’, in M. Lackner, I. Amelung, and J. Kurtz (eds),

312

168.

169. 170. 171.

172. 173. 174. 175. 176.

177. 178.

179. 180.

NOTES

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43 – 48

New Terms for New Ideas: Western Knowledge and Lexical Change in Late Imperial China (Leiden, 2001); William F. Hanks, ‘Translating Worlds: The Epistemological Space of Translation’, HAU Journal of Ethnographic Theory 4/2 (2014); and Richter, ‘More Than a Two-Way’. Walter Benjamin, ‘The Task of the Translator: An Introduction to the Translation of Baudelaire’s Tableaux Parisiens’, in M. Bullock and M.W. Jennings (eds), Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings 1913– 1926 (Cambridge, 1999 [1996]). Brodzki, Can These Bones Live?, p. 1. Bassnett, Translation. For an introduction to the Tibetan government pre-1951, see Melvyn C. Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, 1913– 1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State (New Delhi, 1993 [1989]). Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bod kyi rtsa khrims/ Constitution of Tibet (Dharamsala, 1963). Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (Dharamsala, 1991). This institutional change has been elaborated elsewhere in detail. See for instance the macro-analysis by Roemer, Tibetan Government. Brox, Constructing a Tibetan. The Jonang tradition has unsuccessfully sought representation in the Tibetan parliament-in-exile. See: Hill Post, Jonang Buddhists Seek Representation in Tibetan Parliament in Exile. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Buddhism, Asian Values, and Democracy’, Journal of Democracy 10/1 (1999). I have established that ideas of democracy are expressed in particular ways within the Tibetan language. Schwartz’s very interesting article on the central role that democracy has taken in the protests inside Tibet must be highlighted here, since it deals with how democracy is expressed in the Tibetan language. Schwartz presents how Tibetans inside Tibet, who took part in uprisings in the late 1980s, understand democracy. He demonstrates how these Tibetans relate to the Tibetan past and to chos, religion, but also borrow words from the communist lexicon when they explain the meaning of democracy – a word that, Schwartz argues, was coined in Tibetan to translate communist propaganda. Furthermore, Schwartz enquires into how these Tibetans understand and interlink the concepts of democracy, freedom and human rights in their calls for independence in Tibet. See Ronald David Schwartz, ‘Democracy, Tibetan Independence, and Protest Under Chinese Rule’, The Tibet Journal 17/2 (1992). Gampopa, The Jewel Ornament of Liberation, trans. Khenpo Konchog Gyaltsen Rinpoche (Ithaca, 1998), p. 184ff. Tibetan-language interview with Pema Tseten (pseudonym, male 80), Bylakuppe, January 2007.

NOTES

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313

181. Tibetan-language interview with Choegon Rinpoche (male 38), Clement town, November 2006. 182. The following presentation of the perspective of the gift is inspired by several studies on gift giving, reciprocity, social contracts and exchange in other contexts: Rodney Needham, ‘Polythetic Classification: Convergence and Consequences’, Man: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 10/3 (1975); Maurice Godelier, The Enigma of the Gift (Chicago, 1999 [1996]); Aafke E. Komter (ed.), The Gift: An Interdisciplinary Perspective (Amsterdam, 1996); Karen Sykes, Arguing with Anthropology: An Introduction to Critical Theories of the Gift (London, 2005); Bronislaw Malinowski, ‘The Principle of Give and Take Pervading Tribal Life’, Crime and Custom in Savage Society (London, 1926); Bronislaw Malinowski, Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An Account of Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea (Prospect Heights, 1984 [1922]); Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies (London, 1993 [1950]); Jonathan Parry, ‘The Gift, the Indian Gift and the “Indian Gift”’, Man: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 21/3 (1986); James Laidlaw, ‘A Free Gift Makes No Friends’, Man: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 6/4 (2000); Mary Douglas, ‘Foreword: No Free Gifts’, in M. Mauss (ed.), The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies (London, 1993 [1950]); C.A. Gregory, ‘Exchange and Reciprocity’, in T. Ingold (ed.), Companion Encyclopedia of Anthropology (London, 2005 [1994]). Additionally, Aziz has inquired into economic exchange and moral reciprocation among Tibetans: Barbara Nimri Aziz, ‘Social Cohesion and Reciprocation in a Tibetan Community in Nepal’, in B. Misra and J. Preston (eds), Community, Self, and Identity (The Hague, 1978). I do not know of any studies into gift exchange in Tibetan society, but there exist two studies into the Chinese State’s development project in Tibet explored through the lens of the gift: Yeh has argued in her book that the State’s development project is presented as a gift to the Tibetans with the purpose of territorializing Tibet, and Barnett has described the historical SinoTibetan relations through the lens of gift-giving. See Emily T. Yeh, Taming Tibet: Landscape Transformation and the Gift of Chinese Development (Itacha, 2013); and Robert Barnett, ‘Tibet’, in W.A. Joseph (ed.), Politics in China: An Introduction (Oxford, 2014). 183. Malinowski, Argonauts of the Western, p. 177ff. 184. Malinowski, ‘The Principle of Give’, p. 40. 185. Parry, ‘The Gift’. 186. Mauss, The Gift. 187. Annette Weiner, Inalienable Possessions: The Paradox of Keeping-While-Giving (Berkeley, 1992). 188. Editorial, ‘Pitfalls of Gifted Democracy’, Tibetan Review 35/7 (2000), p. 3. 189. Editorial, ‘Time to Unpack our Gift of Democracy’, Tibetan Review, September (2010), p. 3. 190. Laidlaw, ‘A Free Gift’, p. 621.

314 191. 192. 193. 194. 195. 196. 197. 198. 199. 200. 201. 202. 203. 204.

205.

NOTES

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51 – 62

Godelier, The Enigma, p. 174. Weiner, Inalienable Possessions. Godelier, The Enigma, pp. 205– 7. Editorial, ‘Experiments in Democracy’, Tibetan Review 17/8 (1982), p. 3. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Lhamo (pseudonym, female 39), McLeod Ganj, October 2012. Gregory, ‘Exchange and Reciprocity’, p. 920. Parry, ‘The Gift’, p. 467. Malinowski, Argonauts of the Western. Claude Le´vi-Strauss, ‘The Principle of Reciprocity’, in A.E. Komter (ed.), The Gift: An Interdisciplinary Perspective (Amsterdam, 1996 [1957]), pp. 18 – 25. Georg Simmel, ‘Faithfulness and Gratitude’, in A.E. Komter (ed.), The Gift: An Interdisciplinary Perspective (Amsterdam, 1996), pp. 39 – 48. Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political’; ‘Constructing a Tibetan’. Parry, ‘The Gift’, p. 454. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. Cf. Joy on the life trajectorys of objects. Jody Joy, ‘Reinvigorating Object Biography: Reproducing the Drama of Object Lives’, World Archaeology 41/4 (2009), pp. 540– 56. While this book is not considered as a work of anthropology but translation studies, I use thick description in order to provide the full meaning of the interlocutors’ translations of democracy. Similar to Geertz, I see culture as a form of ongoing interpretive practice, which means that in order to understand the diverse translations of democracy, I aim at seeing translations from an emic perspective, and therefore analyse the interlocutors’ statements ethnosemantically and provide their contexts. Clifford Geertz, ‘Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture’, The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays (New York, 1993 [1973]), pp. 3 –30.

Chapter 1

The Dalai Lama and Authoritative Speech

1. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 2. This dual role is discussed in Chapter 4. 3. Tibetan-language interview with Choegon Rinpoche (male 38), Clement town, November 2006. 4. See Tsering Shakya, The Dragon in the Land of Snows: A History of Modern Tibet (New York, 1999), Chapter 2. 5. Cris Shore and Susan Wright, ‘Conceptualising Policy: Technologies of Governance and the Politics of Visibility’, in C. Shore, S. Wright and P. Davide (eds), Policy Worlds: Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power (New York, 2011), p. 1.

NOTES

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315

6. Ibid., p. 3. 7. The insights into the Dalai Lama’s discourse have been generated through a two-fold analytical strategy of diachronic and synchronic analysis in which I have systematically registered the Dalai Lama’s discourse relating to democracy. Most speeches can be found in the 14 volumes of collected Tibetanlanguage speeches by the Dalai Lama published by the Department of Information and International Relation (DIIR). Speeches from 2000 onwards have mostly been found in periodicals such as Shes bya (Knowledge), Chab srid bsam blo’i dril bsgrags yig cha (Information Bulletin on Political Thinking), Bod kyi dus bab (Tibet Times), as well as the Tibetan-language websites of the Dalai Lama (www.gyalwarinpoche.com) and the CTA (http://bod.asia/category/statements/ his-holiness/). Few speeches have been translated into English. I also accessed the word-for-word transcribed proceedings from the parliament-in-exile. These proceedings were made public in 1991 under the title ‘Bulletin of the Assembly’ (Spyi ‘thus lhan ‘dzoms kyi gsar gnas), and from 1993 onwards as ‘Assembly of Tibetan People’s Deputies’ Proceedings’ (Bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs/ gros tshogs las rim gsar shog). They were available at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, but proceedings before 1991 were made available to me by then speaker of the parliament-in-exile Pema Jungne and the legislative counsel Tenzin Norbu. Today, proceedings are aired live on TV as well as published on the internet (www.chithu.org). 8. I have relied on the unedited speeches by the Dalai Lama including speeches not specifically concerning democracy. Therefore I have not consulted the edited volume known as the ‘Roadmap of Democracy’, which is a collection of selected statements on democratisation by the Dalai Lama 1960– 2011 and selected statements by the council and the Tibetan parliament-in-exile delivered on the so-called Democracy Day on 2 September from 1980 to 2010. Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre (ed.), Mang gtso’i lam bu (Delhi, 2011). 9. Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre, Tibet’s Parliament in Exile (New Delhi, 2003), pp. 15, 21. 10. Ibid., p. 18. 11. Ibid., p. 9. 12. Ibid., p. 29. 13. Department of Information and International Relations (ed.), International Resolutions and Recognitions on Tibet (1959 to 1997) (Dharmsala, 1997). 14. John Kenneth Knaus, Orphans of the Cold War: America and the Tibetan Struggle for Survival (New York, 1999), p. 252. 15. Ernest A. Gross, ‘Tibetans Plan for Tomorrow’, Foreign Affairs 40/1 (1961), p. 138. 16. Ibid., p. 139. 17. Ibid., p. 142. 18. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bod kyi rtsa khrims/ Constitution of Tibet (Dharamsala, 1963).

316

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70 –73

19. Gross, ‘Tibetans Plan’, p. 141. Dalai Lama XIV, Guidelines for Future Tibet’s Polity and the Basic Features of its Constitution (Dharamsala, 1992), p. 4. 20. Ibid., p. 5. 21. Gross, ‘Tibetans Plan’, p. 141. 22. Ann Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization among Tibetans in Exile’, Journal of Asian Studies 66/1 (2007). 23. Ibid., p. 108. 24. Parliament-in-Exile, Bod kyi rtsa khrims, p. 11. 25. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ slob gra khag sogs la shes yon slob sbyong byed sgo’i skor stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 1 [Speeches 1959– 1991]) (Dharamsala, 2000), p. 14. 26. Chos srid zung ‘brel or ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ is the historical ideology of the traditional Tibetan state in which there was a close relationship between chos and srid, and can be understood as the ‘spiritual’ and the ‘temporal’, or even ‘religion’ and ‘politics’. See Chapter 4 for more detail on this Tibetan maxim, and for a discussion on its relation to competing secularisms, see my article ‘Changing the Tibetan’. 27. To my knowledge, the term ‘theocracy’ has not been sufficiently discussed regarding its applicability to describe governance in Tibet. Theocracy, which literally means ‘rule by God,’ has in a general context been defined as ‘the principle that religious authority should prevail over political authority through the domination of church over state’. Heywood, Politics, p. 432. To label the traditional Tibetan state theocracy, thus referring to rule by God and to the institutionalised religion’s precedence in governance, is, of course, doubtful. 28. Dalai Lama XIV, Shes yon slob sbyong byed sgo’i skor (Vol. 1 [1959 –1991]), pp. 39 – 40. 29. The full Tibetan-language statement is printed in: Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston/ spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas gsum bcu’i dus dran skabs so sor stsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin phyogs bsdebs/ {phyi lo 1960 nas 2005 bar} (Dharamsala, 2005), pp. 27– 30. There also exists an English-language version; Dalai Lama XIV, Tibet and the Tibetan People’s Struggle: 10 March Statements of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (1961 – 2005) (Dharamsala, 2005), pp. 8 – 10, which is a text meant for an international audience. The English version differs greatly from the Tibetan statement in the way that the former appeals directly to the international democracy discourse, while this is omitted in the Tibetan version. In this context it should be noted that the Dalai Lama delivered two Tibetan-language addresses every year on 10 March: a ‘teaching’ (bka’ slob) and a ‘statement’ (gsung ‘phrin). Only the latter is also published in English. Since I am interested in the Tibetan-language representations and imaginations, there are instances in this book when I quote from Tibetan-language statements regardless of whether there exists an English-language version. Interestingly, the first time that the Dalai Lama did not give any state of the nation address on 10 March was in 2012 – the first year that he attended the commemoration

NOTES

30.

31.

32. 33. 34. 35.

36.

37. 38. 39.

40.

41.

42. 43.

TO PAGES

73 –78

317

as a Dalai Lama without political office. Thus, when he and the exile leadership observed the 53rd Tibetan National Uprising Day at his temple in Dharamsala, official speeches were delivered by the speaker of parliament, Penpa Tsering, and the prime-minister-in-exile, Lobsang Sangay. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas rgya che’i bod mi ser skya mang tshogs la blang dor byed sgo’i skor stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Dharamsala, 2000), pp. 132– 3. Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston/ gong sa mchog nas gsum bcu’i dus dran skabs so sor btsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin dang bka’ slob khag phyogs bsgrigs/ 1960– 1986 (Dharamsala, 1986), p. 121. Ibid., pp. 55 – 6. Dalai Lama XIV, Byed sgo’i skor (Vol. 1 [1960 –1978]), p. 263. Samuel P. Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman, 1991). Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bod nas rgya gar du gnyen ‘phrad dang/ grwa sa khag la slob gnyer byed mkhan/ spyir btang slob sbyong ched yong mkhan rgan gzhon rnams la blang dor byed sgo’i bka’ slob rim stsal phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 1 [Speeches 1982– 1992]) (Dharamsala, 2002a), p. 175. Robert Barnett, ‘“Violated Specialness”. Western Political Representations of Tibet’, in T. Dodin and H. Ra¨ther (eds), Imagining Tibet: Perceptions, Projections, & Fantasies (Boston, 2001). Department of Information and International Relations, International Resolutions. Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre, Tibet’s Parliament. The Dalai Lama generally makes a point of calling this ‘meaningful’, ‘genuine’ or ‘real’ autonomy. Thus he highlights that, although there already is an autonomous Tibet, i.e. Tibet Autonomous Region, he does not agree with its territorial boundaries or the way it is governed. See: Department of Information and International Relations, The Middle-Way Approach: A Framework for Resolving the Issue of Tibet (Dharamsala, 2005). As for The Strasbourg Proposal, the Tibetan cabinet-in-exile withdrew it on ‘Democracy Day’ in 1991 because the Chinese government had not shown any commitment. Dalai Lama XIV, Acceptance Speech (1989). Available at http://www.nobelprize. org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1989/lama-acceptance_en.html (accessed 20 August 2015). Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bod mi mang spyi ‘thus kyi gros tshogs khag dang/ bka’ shag gis mtshon gzhung zhabs las byed par stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 1 [Speeches 1959– 1989]) (Dharamsala, 2001a), pp. 400– 8. Ibid., p. 431. Dorjee, ‘Towards Real Democracy’, Rangzen 10/2 (1990), p. 10.

318

NOTES

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78 – 82

44. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (’char zin/) Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile (Draft) (Dharamsala, 1991). 45. Tibetan-language interview with Namgyal Wangdu (male 71), Dekyiling, December 2006. 46. I have recalled this debate in Chapter 4 and have also discussed it in my article on contesting Tibetan secularisms: Trine Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan Way? Contesting Secularisms in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in S. Arslan and P. Schwieger (eds), Tibetan Studies: An Anthology (Anbieter, 2010). 47. Brox, Trine, ‘Tibetan Culture as Battlefield: How the Term “Tibetan Culture” Is Utilized as a Political Strategy’, in L. Schmithausen (ed.), Buddhismus in Geschichte Und Gegenwart: Gewalt Und Gewaltlosigkeit Im Buddhismus (Hamburg, 2006), pp. 85– 105. 48. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas gsum bcu’i dus dran thengs lnga bcu pa’i thog yongs khyab tu stsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin/’, Shes bya 3 (2009), p. 9. 49. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bca’ khrims 1991. 50. This special matrix of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile reflected how religious and regional affinities was important parameters for defining the Tibetan people, and the parliament quota system was defined by these parameters although the number of seats attached to each category had undergone transformations in the ten parliaments that had emerged between 1960 and 1990, ranging from 12- to 17-member parliaments. For example, in the first parliament established in 1960, there were only three representatives from each of the three provinces and one from each of the four major Buddhist traditions. In the second and third parliament, however, one seat was reserved for a female representative (this seat was lost again in 1974) and in addition, the Dalai Lama could nominate one prominent Tibetan. The number of MPs was fixed to 43 plus three appointed members in 1991, but was decreased by three members in 2003 when the Dalai Lama renounced his right to appoint candidates, and then increased by one in 2010 with an additional North American seat. Cf. Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre, Tibet’s Parliament. I describe this template in connection to the election rules in Chapter 5. 51. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bca’ Khrims 1991, pp. 15 – 34. The departments were earlier called lhan khang in Tibetan and ‘council’ in English. 52. Ibid., pp. 55 – 62. 53. Dalai Lama XIV, Guidelines for Future. A Tibetan-language version of this document has also been released: Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Ma ‘ongs bod kyi chab srid lam ston dang/ rtsa khrims snying don/ (Dharamsala, 1998). 54. Dalai Lama XIV, Guidelines for Future, p. 6. 55. Ibid., pp. 13 – 14. 56. Ibid., p. 7. 57. Ibid., pp. 12 – 13. 58. Ibid., pp. 10 – 11.

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85 – 92

319

59. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bod mi mang spyi ‘thus kyi gros tshogs khag dang/ bka’ shag gis mtshon gzhung zhabs las byed par stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 2 [Speeches 1989– 1999]) (Dharamsala, 2001b), pp. 424– 5. 60. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas rgya che’i bod mi ser skya mang tshogs la blang dor byed sgo’i skor stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 2 [Speeches 1979– 1992]) (Dharamsala, 2000), p. 457. 61. Other examples include a speech from 1991: Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston [1960 – 2005], p. 167. Even old monk officials in independent Tibet, the Dalai Lama once argued, had similar ideas and wanted modern reforms: Dalai Lama XIV, Spyi ‘thus dang/ bka’ shag (Vol. 1 [1959 – 1989]), p. 426. 62. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bod mi mang spyi ‘thus kyi gros tshogs khag dang/ bka’ shag gis mtshon gzhung zhabs las byed par stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/, p. 429. 63. Ibid., p. 403. 64. Dalai Lama XIV, Spyi ‘thus dang/ bka’ shag (Vol. 2 [1989– 1999]), p. 41. 65. Dalai Lama XIV, Byed sgo’i skor (Vol. 2 [1979 –1992]), p. 457. 66. Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston/ 1987 nas 1991 (Dharamsala, 1997), p. 72. 67. Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston [1960– 2005], pp. 159 – 60. 68. For a review of the Sino-Tibetan dialogue prior to this, see Tashi Rabgey and Tseten Wangchuk Sharlo, Sino-Tibetan Dialogue in the Post-Mao Era: Lessons and Prospects (Vol. 12) (Washington, 2004). The ‘Dalai clique’ refers to the fourteenth Dalai Lama, the CTA, and their supporters. The term ‘splittism’ (Chi.: fen lie zhuyin) is used to describe the actions that are either challenging China’s territorial integrity, trying to disintegrate China or to attempt liberation from China, and it is used to describe a variety of different incidents, ranging from protest in Xinjiang to self-immolations in Tibet. 69. Parliament Proceedings, Bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs/ gros tshogs las rim gsar shog/ skabs bcu gsum pa’i tshogs dus dang po/ (Vol. 2 [2, 20 June]) (Dharamsala, 2001), p. 5. 70. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas la dwags khul gnas bod ‘bangs kyi mang gtso’i dus dran thengs zhe lnga pa’i mdzad sgo’i thog stsal ba’i bka’ slob/’, Shes bya 38/9 (2005), p. 4. 71. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bod nas rgya gar du gnyen ‘phrad dang/ grwa sa khag la slob gnyer byed mkhan/ spyir btang slob sbyong ched yong mkhan rgan gzhon rnams la blang dor byed sgo’i bka’ slob rim stsal phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 3 [Speeches 1995– 1999]) (Dharamsala, 2002b), p. 211. 72. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Statement from His Holiness the Dalai Lama to the Assembly of the Tibetan People’s Deputies’, Tibetan Bulletin 2/4 (1998).

320

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73. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (Dharamsala, 1998), p. 11. 74. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bca’ khrims (2005), p. 12. 75. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i ‘os bsdu’i sgrig gzhi (Dharamsala, 2005), Chapter 6. 76. Election Commission, Mi mang nas thad kar ‘os ‘dems byas pa’i bka’ khri skabs so so’i ‘dngos ’os bsdu chen mo’i skabs mi gzhung deb bkod dang/ dngos su ‘os ‘phen ji byung/ brgya cha bcas kyi re’u mig gsham gsal/ (Dharamsala [document acquired 6 March 2007], 2007). 77. Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston (1960– 2005), p. 5. 78. Ibid. 79. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog gis skabs bcu gsum pa’i gros tshogs tshogs dus brgyad pa’i thog stsal ba’i bka’ slob/’, Shes bya 38/9 (2004), p. 4. 80. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas phyi lo 2002 phyi zla 9 tshes 23 nyin gros tshogs tshogs dus bzhi pa’i thog stsal ba’i bka’ slob/’, Shes bya 35/10 (2002), p. 8. 81. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘bcu gsum pa’i gros tshogs’, pp. 1– 2. 82. Dalai Lama XIV, Chab srid lam ston (1960– 2005), pp. 246 – 7. 83. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘La dwags khul gnas’, pp. 6 – 7. 84. Editorial, ‘Resolving Tibetan Democracy’s Paradox of Reincarnation’, Tibetan Review 42/12 (2007); Editorial, ‘Dalai Lama May Nominate Own Successor’, Tibetan Review 42/12 (2007). 85. International Campaign for Tibet, New State Regulations on Recognition of Tibetan Reincarnates: 2007.9.25. ICT Briefing Document (2007). Available at http://www.savetibet.de/fileadmin/user_upload/content/berichte/Briefing_ Papier_Reinkarnationsgesetz.pdf (accessed 21 August 2015). 86. Ibid. 87. Robert Barnett, Between the Lines: Interpreting the Dalai Lama’s Statement on his Successor (2011). Available at http://www.thechinabeat.org/?p¼3873 (accessed 21 August 2015). 88. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Gong sa skyabs mgon sku phreng bcu bzhi pa chen po mchog nas gzhis byes bod mis mtshon bod brgyud nang bstan gyi rjes ‘jug ser skya kun dang/ bod dang bod mir ‘brel chags kyi skye ‘gro yongs la stsal ba’i gal che’i bka’ yig’, Shes bya 10 (2011). 89. Ibid.; Barnett, Between the Lines. 90. Ibid. 91. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gang sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas gsum bcu’i dus dran thengs 52 pa’i thog yongs khyab tu btsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin/’, Shes bya 3 (2011). 92. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog gis theg chen chos gling gtsug lag khang gi chos rwa bar cho ‘phrul smon lam chen mo’i tshogs

NOTES

93. 94. 95. 96.

97.

98. 99.

100. 101. 102.

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mgon du chibs sgyur bskyang te chos ‘brel dang bka’ slob za ba rgyas stsal ba/’, Shes bya 3 (2011), pp. 26– 7. Ibid., p. 27. Ibid. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Bcu bzhi pa’i bod mi mang’. Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55 – 74. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas skabs bcu bzhi pa’i bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs dus bcu gcig pa’i thog stsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin/’, Shes bya 3 (2011), p. 20. Ibid. Tibet Justice Center, Legal Issues Implicated by the Dalai Lama’s Devolution of Power: A Briefing Memorandum Respectfully Submitted to the Tibetan Governmentin-Exile and Participants in the May 2011 Tibetan National General Meeting (2011). Available at http://www.tibetjustice.org/features/devolution/ DevolutionMemo.pdf (accessed 7 April 2011, nonfunctioning link 22 August 2015). Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Democracy in Exile: Special Report 2012 (Dharamsala, 2012), p. 30. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bca’ khrims 2011. Shore and Wright, Conceptualising Policy, p. 3.

Chapter 2 The Model Settlement 1. Department of Home, Exile Life. . . (ND). Available at http://www.centralti betanreliefcommittee.org/abouts/exile-life.html (accessed 20 August 2015), no pagination. 2. Ibid. 3. Ibid. 4. Fiona McConnell, ‘Governmentality to Practise the State? Constructing a Tibetan Population in Exile’, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space (2011), pp. 78 – 95. 5. Ibid., p. 9. 6. McConnell has unfolded the CTA’s governmentality practices in a number of articles; see ‘De Facto, Displaced, Tacit: The Sovereign Articulations of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’, Political Geography 28/6 (2009), pp. 343 – 52; ‘Governmentality to Practise’; and ‘A State within the State? Exploring Relations between the Indian State and the Tibetan Community and Government-in-Exile’, Contemporary South Asia 19/3 (2011), pp. 297–313. 7. Department of Home, Exile Life.

322

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105 –115

8. Trine Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan Demos in Exile’, Citizenship Studies 16/3 – 4 (2012), pp. 451–67. 9. According to the Home Department, Lugsam has 10,921 inhabitants and Dickey Larsoe 4,469. See Department of Home, Lugsung Samdupling Tibetan Settlement, Bylakuppe: A brief Story of Lugsung Samdupling, Bylakuppe, K.S. (ND). Available at http://www.centraltibetanreliefcommittee.org/settlements/india/ south/lugsung-samdupling.html (accessed 21 August 2015). See also Department of Home, Dickyi Larsoe Tibetan Settlement, Bylakuppe: A Brief Story of Dickyi Larso, Bylakuppe, K.S. (2012). Available at http://www.centraltibetanrelief committee.org/settlements/india/south/dickyi-larsoe.html (accessed 21 August 2015). The Lugsam settlement reported in 2007 that 14,000 Tibetans lived there: Lugsam, Lugsung Samdupling Tibetan Settlement, Bylakuppe (Bylakuppe, document acquired 15 January 2007). Facts and numbers in the following introduction to the twin settlements are based on numerous talks with the administrations in 2007 and the written material that they provided. 10. For more details on South Indian settlements, confer with the CTA’s reports Bureau of H.H. the Dalai Lama, Tibetans in Exile: 1959– 1969 (Dharamsala, 1969); Information Office, Tibetans in Exile: 1959– 1980 (Dharamsala, 1981) and the accounts by John F. Avedon, In Exile from the Land of Snows: The Dalai Lama and Tibet since the Chinese Conquest (New Delhi, 1997 [1979]); Melvyn C. Goldstein, ‘Ethnogenesis and Resource Competition among Tibetan Refugees in South India: A New Face to the Indo-Tibetan Interface’, in J.F. Fisher (ed.), Himalayan Anthropology: The Indo-Tibetan Interface (The Hague, 1978), pp. 395– 420; Jan Magnusson, Subramanya Nagarajarao, and Geoff Childs, ‘South Indian Tibetans: Development Dynamics in the Early Stages of the Tibetan Refugee Settlement Lugs zung bsam grub gling, Bylakuppe’, Journal of the International Association of Tibetan Studies 4 (2008). Available at http://www.thlib.org/collections/texts/jiats/#jiats¼ /downloads/ (accessed 21 August 2015). See also T.S. Palakshappa, Tibetans in India: A Case Study of Mundgod Tibetans (New Delhi, 1978). 11. Tibetan-language interviews with Tsering Palden (male 71) and Dorje Damdul (male 80), January 2007. 12. Avedon, In Exile, p. 72ff; and Bureau of H.H. the Dalai Lama, Tibetans in Exile, p. 2. 13. See also Timm Lau, ‘A Diaspora Concept that Works: Tibetan Economy and Identity in India and Canada’, in A. Quayson and G. Daswani (eds), A Companion to Diaspora and Transnationalism (Chichester, 2013), pp. 33 – 45. 14. Tibetan-language interview with Pasang Chokpa (pseudonym, male 51), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 15. Tibetan-language interview with Sonam Diki (pseudonym, female 63), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 16. Tibetan-language interview with Kesang Tsomo (pseudonym, female 43), Bylakuppe, January 2007.

NOTES

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17. English-language interview with Tenpa Dorje (pseudonym, male 51), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 18. Dalai Lama XIV, Freedom in Exile: The Autobiography of His Holiness the Dalai Lama of Tibet (London, 1991), p. 164. 19. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 23), Delhi, April 2007. 20. Department of Education, Btsan byol bod mi’i gzhi rim gyi shes yon srid byus/ Basic Education Policy for Tibetans in Exile (Dharamsala, 2005). 21. Ibid., p. 24. 22. Ibid., p. 25. 23. See Seonaigh MacPherson, Education and Sustainability: Learning Across the Diaspora, Indigenous, and Minority Divide (New York, 2011), p. 135ff. 24. Tibet Justice Center, Tibet’s Stateless Nationals II: Tibetan Refugees in India (2011). Available at http://www.tibetjustice.org/reports/stateless-nationalsii/stateless-nationals-ii.pdf (accessed 21 August 2015), p. 63. Until 2013, there were three kinds of schools for Tibetans in India: schools run by the CTA, by charities or by the Central Tibetan Schools Administration. The latter was established in 1961 under the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India, but transferred its responsibilities of the Tibetan schools to the CTA in January 2013. GoI Press Information Bureau, Transfer of Schools from Central Tibetan Schools Administration to Department of Education, Central Tibetan Administration (2013). Available at http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid¼ 91474 (accessed 21 August 2015). 25. Aihwa Ong, Flexible Citizenship: The Cultural Logics of Transnationality (Durham, 1999), p. 19. 26. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 23), Delhi, April 2007. 27. English-language interview with Sonam Topgyal (pseudonym, male 39), Mussoorie, December 2006. 28. Ong, Flexible Citizenship. 29. Julia Meredith Hess, Immigrant Ambassadors: Citizenship and Belonging in the Tibetan Diaspora (Stanford, 2009). 30. Ibid. 31. English-language interview with Sangye Tendar (pseudonym, male 24), Bangalore, January 2007. 32. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 33. English-language interview with Chemi Dolma (pseudonym, female 23), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 34. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Namgyal (pseudonym, male 64), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 35. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007.

324

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122 –130

36. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 40), January 2007. 37. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Namgyal (pseudonym, male 64), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 38. English-language interview with Kelkhang Rinpoche (male 30), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 39. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 40), January 2007. 40. Tibetan-language interview with Gelek Gyatso (pseudonym, male 53), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 41. An English version of the 1991 Charter can be found on the Internet: Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile (1990). Available at http://www.tibetjustice.org/materials/ tibet/tibet6.html (accessed 21 August 2015). 42. The order of spyi mi, brgya dpon, bcu dpon and so forth are not only used for making the local democratic set-up in settlements. I have also heard these designations used for Tibetan military ranks, for organising food distribution in transit camps, and for making labour collectives in the road construction sites during the 1960s. For example, Nima Sichoe recalled how when he built roads in Manali together with other Tibetan exiles in the 1960s, he was appointed as the brgya dpon, the leader of the labourers. He also remembered that the system of village leader and group leaders already existed in Tibet, but, he emphasised, electing these through democratic vote was something new (Tibetan-language interview with Nima Sichoe [pseudonym, male 78], Bylakuppe, January 2007). In fact, the twin settlements of Bylakuppe were built upon an autochthonous Tibetan organisation, with settlement administrators resembling pre-1951 district commissioners installed by the Lhasa government in every district. They supervised and represented village councils that in their turn had appointed elders handling the day-to-day administration of the Utsang village described by Melvyn C. Goldstein, ‘An Anthropological Study of the Tibetan Political System’ PhD diss., University of Washington, 1968; ‘Taxation and the Structure of a Tibetan Village’, Central Asiatic Journal 15/3 (1971); ‘Ethnogenesis and Resource’. If the order was not entirely new or unfamiliar to Tibetans in India then neither was the ideal democratic practice supporting this settlement organisation, namely the participation that was expected from everybody, especially in the form of democratic elections. 43. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bca’ khrims (2005), p. 45. The four settlements that have elected their own administrator are Bir, Dharamsala, Ladakh and Solan Bon Settlement. See: Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Democracy in Exile, p. 42. 44. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Bca’ khrims (2005), pp. 47 – 8. 45. English-language interview with Damdul Jingkarbon (male 60), Dekyiling, November 2005. 46. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Kungar (male 69), McLeod Ganj, October 2006.

NOTES TO PAGES 131 –140

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47. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Yonten (pseudonym, male 69), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 48. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Tashi (pseudonym, male 40), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 49. English-language interview with Deden Nyima (pseudonym, female 23), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 50. Tibetan-language interview with Sonam Diki (pseudonym, female 63), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 51. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Tashi (pseudonym, male 40), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 52. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Yonten (pseudonym, male 69), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 53. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Yonten (pseudonym, male 69), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 54. Tibetan-language interview with Ngawang Chophel (pseudonym, male 71), January 2007. 55. English-language interview with Pema Thinley (male 44), Delhi, April 2007. 56. Liisa H. Malkki, ‘Refugees and Exile: From “Refugee Studies” to the National Order of Things’, Annual Review of Anthropology 24 (1995). Tibetan exiles have had a political culture ruled by strong norms of consensus, unity and loyalty; see Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55–74. The voice of Chemi Dolma reminds us of this when she in a previous section called out to her peers, saying that because they are refugees, they have extraordinary responsibilities and should ‘work as one’ (English-language interview with Chemi Dolma [pseudonym, female 23], Bylakuppe, February 2007). These norms have been of high value with the CTA, and in some cases they have even been placed above the ideal of democracy (as we shall see in Chapter 6). Bylakuppe has not been a seamless society, and conflicts have been abundant – here as elsewhere. See for instance: Jan Magnusson, ‘How Tibetans Deal With Political Conflicts in Exile: The National Democratic Party of Tibet Enters Exile Politics’, Working Paper 5 (A˚rhus, 1998); Goldstein, ‘Ethnogenesis and Resource’; Magnusson et al., ‘South Indian Tibetans’. Some of these frictions are discussed in Chapters 4, 5 and 6 which present the main tensions enveloping the gift of democracy. 57. Arnold van Gennep, The Rites of Passage (London, 1965). 58. Liisa H. Malkki, Purity and Exile: Violence, Memory, and National Cosmology Among Hutu Refugees in Tanzania (Chicago, 1995); and Victor Turner, The Forest of Symbols: Aspects of Ndembu Ritual (Ithaca, 1970). 59. Liisa H. Malkki, ‘Refugees and Exile: From “Refugee Studies” to the National Order of Things’. 60. Yossi Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty: Political Exiles in the Age of the Nation-State (Middletown, 1989), p. 34.

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Dharamsala Democrats and Organisations

1. Muthiah Alagappa (ed.), Civil Society and Political Change in Asia (Stanford, 2004), p. 31. 2. The neo-Tocquevillean civil society ideal is summarised by Alagappa in the following manner: ‘Civil society is viewed as a supporting structure to democratise the state. Associational life is thought to provide the social infrastructure for liberal democracy, supply the means to limit, resist, and curb the excesses of the state and market, present alternatives when they fail, facilitate service delivery at the local level, assist in conflict management, deepen democracy (by cultivating civic virtues, establishing democratic norms, and spreading democracy to more domains of life), offer a voice to disadvantaged groups, and promote economic development.’ See Alagappa, Civil Society, p. 41. This is the most adopted academic approach to civil society today, as is examplified in the works of several scholars: Michael Edwards, Civil Society (Cambridge, 2004); Adam B. Seligman, ‘Civil Society as Idea and Ideal’, in S. Chambers and W. Kymlicka (eds), Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (New Jersey, 2002); Graeme Gill, The Dynamics of Democratization (Basingstoke, 2000); Jeff Haynes, Democracy and Civil Society in the Third World: Politics and New Political Movements (Cambridge, 2003 [1997]); Rob Jenkins, ‘Mistaking “Governance” for “Politics”: Foreign Aid, Democracy, and the Construction of Civil Society’, in S. Kaviraj and S. Khilnani (eds), Civil Society: History and Possibilities (Cambridge, 2001); Robert D. Putnam, Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy (Princeton, 1993); and Lars Rudebeck and Olle To¨rnquist (eds), Democratization in the Third World: Concrete Cases in Comparative and Theoretical Perspective (London, 1998). There is no agreement among scholars, however, whether political parties and religious groups are included in the sphere of civil society, and what the relationship between civil society and the media should be. Some claim that only voluntary, democratic, modern and civil organisations form civil society, while others maintain that all kinds of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) qualify as civil society associations. 3. Michael A. Mosher, ‘Are Civil Societies the Transmission Belts of Ethical Tradition?’, in S. Chambers and W. Kymlicka (eds), Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (New Jersey, 2002), pp. 207– 30. 4. Ibid. One example is the international relations scholar Wiarda who argues that the Tocquevillian associability model is glaringly absent in Asia, and he explains this by referring to what he considers to be so-called Asian values. See: Howard J. Wiarda, Civil Society: The American Model and Third World Development (Boulder, 2003). Wiarda argues that modern institutions like political parties, interest groups and civil society actually reinforce the old state-centric structures, which are updated and then given a Western slant (ibid., p. 72). According to Wiarda, what passes for civil society in Asia can be

NOTES

5.

6.

7. 8. 9. 10.

11. 12.

13. 14. 15. 16.

17.

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so intertwined with government agencies and state decision-making that it is impossible to separate them from these institutions and is even created by them (ibid., p. 73). Where civil societies are flourishing, Wiarda contends, they were formed around safe political issues which do not challenge the state (ibid., p. 82). In the context of India, the Tibetan freedom struggle under the leadership of the Dalai Lama and consisting of the CTA and numerous non-governmental organisations make up a relatively loud voice as a civil society actor in relation to the state of India. Ann Frechette, ‘Constructing the State in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in R. Boyd and T.-W. Ngo (eds), State Making Projects in Asia (London, 2006), pp. 127 – 49. Ibid., p. 127. Alagappa, Civil Society, p. 9. Ibid., p. 33. ‘Gangnam Style’ refers to a particular style and dance move shown in the popular music video by the South Korean musician Psy released in 2012, which has been imitated worldwide with a plethora of amateur videos made by private persons and organisations that have been uploaded on YouTube. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. The name skyid sdug testifies to their ideal. Skyid means happiness and sdug means sorrow, and as the president of one skyid sdug, Jampa Yonten, expressed it in our conversation in 2006: In a skyid sdug the members ‘share collectively the dark and light times of life’ (Tibetan-language interview with Jampa Yonten [pseudonym, male 80], McLeod Ganj, October 2006). I also deal with the skyid sdug in Chapter 6. Tibetan-language interview with Rinchen Paldon (pseudonym, female 58), McLeod Ganj, October 2006. English-language interview with Karma Yeshi (male 37), Gangkyi, April 2007. Tibetan-language interview with Lhakpa Dolma and Lhakpa Bhuti (pseudonym, female 46 and 52), Clemet Town, February 2006. I will return to the issue of ‘anti-Dalai Lama’ in Chapter 6 when I discuss how some exiles’ deeply felt need to secure unity has resulted in sanctioning what they see as disloyalty. See also Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55 –74. In English: Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, A Guide to Democracy for Tibetan Secondary School Children (Dharamsala, 1999); Tibetan: Mang gtso’i skor gyi shes yon deb chung/ mang gtso zhes pa’i go don gang yin nam/ des las don gang ‘dra byed/ mang gtso’i lam ston dang/ btsan byol bod kyi mang gtso’i ngo

328

18.

19.

20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31.

32. 33.

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sprod/ (Dharamsala, 2000); and its report: Democracy in Exile: Special Report 2012 (Dharamsala, 2012). The following section is based on 40 interviews with former and present TYC leaders at the headquarters, local leaders and ordinary members, and information from TYC’s own publications and webpage (www.tibetan youthcongress.org). Tibetan Youth Congress, Bod kyi gzhon nu’i lhan tshogs/ tshogs chen dang ’gan ’dzin lhan tshogs kyi gros chod phyogs bsgrigs/ (1970 – 2000) (Dharamsala, 2000), p. 220; Bod kyi gzhon nu’i lhan tshogs/ Tibetan Youth Congress ([brochure] Dharamsala, ND), p. 6. English-language interview with Tsering Tenchoe (pseudonym, male 25), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. English-language interview with Kesang Norbu (pseudonym, male 26), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. English-language interview with Diki Choyang (pseudonym, female 22), Dekyiling, December 2006. English-language interview with Tashi Puntsok (pseudonym, male 22), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. English-language interview with Pema Thinley (male 44), Delhi, April 2007. English-language interview with Kesang Norbu (pseudonym, male 26), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. Tibetan Youth Congress, Tibet: The Gap between Fact and Fabrication: The Tibetan Response to China’s White Papers (Dharamsala, 2005). English-language interview with Sangye Tarchin (pseudonym, male 40), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. Margaret Nowak, Tibetan Refugees: Youth and the New Generation of Meaning (New Jersey, 1984), pp. 144– 5. Ann Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal: The Dynamics of International Assistance among a Community in Exile (New York, 2002), p. 179. Helen R. Boyd, The Future of Tibet: The Government-in-Exile Meets the Challenge of Democratization (Vol. 55) (New York, 2004), p. 94. Tseten Norbu, ‘Rebels: The Tibetan Youth Congress’, in D. Bernstorff and H. von Welck (eds), Exile as Challenge: The Tibetan Diaspora (New Delhi, 2004 [2002]), pp. 391– 408. Stephanie Roemer, The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large (New York, 2008), p. 109. This is stated in most introductions to the TYC and its regional branches. See for instance Tibetan Youth Congress, About TYC (2015). Available at http:// www.tibetanyouthcongress.org/about-tyc/ (accessed 21 August 2015), no pagination. When the TYC say in English ‘balanced modern and traditional education’, its Tibetan version is ‘students having inner and outer knowledge’ ( phyi nang gi shes yon ldan pa’i slob phrug): cf. Tibetan Youth Congress, ‘Bcu pa’i bdun/ bod kyi gzhon nu lhan tshogs dbu brnyes pa’i nyin mo/’, Bod kyi gzhon

NOTES

34. 35.

36. 37.

38. 39. 40. 41.

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158 –161

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nu lhan tshogs kyi gtan ‘bebs las ‘gul khag/ ([document acquired from TYC, April 2008], Dharamsala, ND). ‘Inner knowledge’ (nang gi shes yon) most often refers to Buddhist or traditional knowledge, while ‘outer knowledge’ ( phyi’i shes yon) typically refers to non-Buddhist or modern knowledge. English-language interview with Tashi Puntsok (pseudonym, male 22), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. Tibetan Youth Congress, ‘Tshegs chen thengs 13 pa’i gros gzhi gros chod khag gsham gsal/’, Rang btsan 2004/9– 2005/2 (2005), pp. 25 – 9. The commitment to ensure representativity and accountability within the decision-making body is a major concern for the TYC. See for instance its merciless critique of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile: Rangzen, ‘Tibetan Parliamentarians: A Reflection’, Rangzen 20/3 (1995), pp. 7 – 16, 21. Constituency is an issue that has been debated at length in the exile community, not only by the TYC. The idea of having two houses – each answerable to their particular category of electorate, i.e. the two distinct parliamentary chambers – has been inspired by the Indian system with the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha being the lower and upper house respectively of the federal legislature. Dalai Lama XIV, Guidelines for Future. Jan Magnusson, ‘Making Democracy Work in Exile: An Exploratory Analysis of the Democratization of the Tibetan Refugee Community’, in E. Steinkeller (ed.), 7th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies (Graz, 1997), pp. 595 – 608. The Tibetan Review featured several articles on the Tibetan Communist Party: mocking its insignificant three-person membership: ‘Communist Party of Tibetans in Exile is Formed’, Tibetan Review 14/4 (1979); questioning its statements: ‘Seeing Red’, Tibetan Review 15/7 (1980); giving voice to its members, supporters and antagonists: ‘Letters: Premature Step or Towards Ideal Marxism?’, Tibetan Review 14/5 (1979); ‘The Hammer, Sickle & Pen: Manifesto of the Tibetan Communist Party’, Tibetan Review 15/7 (1980); ‘Controversy over the Tibetan Communist Movement – a Personal View’, Tibetan Review 15/7 (1980); ‘Opium and Ideology: The Unreal World of Tibetan Communism’, Tibetan Review 15/7 (1980); ‘Letters: In Defense of an Ideology’, Tibetan Review 15/9 (1980); ‘Letters: Reflections on Tibetan Communism’, Tibetan Review 15/8 (1980); and finally announcing its dissolution: ‘Tibetan Communist Party Dissolved’, Tibetan Review 17/2 –3 (1982). National Democratic Party of Tibet, Bod kyi rgyal yongs mang gtso tshogs pa/ National Democratic Party of Tibet: Brochure-2000 (Dharamsala, 2000), pp. 2 – 3. Tibetan Youth Congress, tshogs chen (1970 – 2000), p. 134. English-language interview with Karma Choephel (male 58), Gangkyi, April 2007. English-language interview with Karma Yeshi (male 37), Gangkyi, April 2007.

330

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162 –167

42. Karma Choephel pointed to religious traditions as political interest groups fighting for seats in the parliament in a similar manner. I have never seen any official campaigning by religious groups before national elections, but clearly the monasteries can efficiently mobilise support for their candidates among its monks and nuns electorate. 43. English-language interview with Chemey Yungdrung (male 31), McLeod Ganj, November 2006. 44. National Democratic Party of Tibet, Bod kyi rgyal yongs mang gtso tshogs pa/ ngo sprod yig cha/ 2000 (Dharamsala, 2000), p. 4. 45. National Democratic Party of Tibet, Manifesto: The National Democratic Party of Tibet (Dharamsala, ND), p. 6. 46. National Democratic Party of Tibet, Bod kyi mi mang spyi mthus skabs 14 pa’i dbus gtsang chos kha’i dngos gzhi’i ‘os gzhi’i re’u mig/ mdo smad/ mdo stod ([documents acquired November 2006], Dharamsala, 2005). 47. Alex Butler has given an account of the historical and symbolic origin of the TWA: Alex Butler, Feminism, Nationalism and Exiled Tibetan Women (New Delhi, 2003), ch. 2. The following section on the TWA is based on 20 interviews with former and present executive members, local leaders and members, TWA’s publications in English e.g. Tibetan Women’s Association, Tibetan Women’s Association ([brochure], Dharamsala, 1994); Tibetan Women’s Association, Current Perspectives (Dharamsala, 2006); and publications in Tibetan e.g. Tibetan Women’s Association, Bod kyi bud med rnams nas rang btsan ‘thab rtsod thog rang srog blos btang gnang ba’i lo rgyus snying bsdus dge’o/ ([brochure], Dharamsala, 1987); Tibetan Women’s Association, Bod kyi bud med lhan tshogs kyi ngo sprod dang las ka’i ngo bo (Dharamsala, 2000); their homepage (www.tibetanwomen.org), as well as the study by Butler, Feminism, Nationalism. 48. English-language interview with Tenzin Dhardon Sharling (female 24), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. 49. Butler, Feminism, Nationalism, p. 98. 50. I will return to this in Chapter 5 when I discuss national and local elections. 51. Tibetan-language interview with Lhakpa Dolma and Lhakpa Bhuti (pseudonym, female 46 and 52), Clemet Town, February 2006. 52. English-language interview with Pema Sangmo (pseudonym, female 37), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 53. Butler, Feminism, Nationalism. 54. Ibid., p. 68. 55. English-language interview with Chemi Dolma (pseudonym, female 23), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 56. See Chapter 2 for graphics illustrating the TWA structure. Bylakuppe RTYC does not have a ‘neighbourhood representative’ (ru dpon), but a ‘team’ (ru khag) for every three villages. 57. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Yangzom (pseudonym, female 71), Bylakuppe, January 2007.

NOTES

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58. English-language interview with Deden Nyima (pseudonym, female 23), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 59. English-language interview with Chemi Dolma (pseudonym, female 23), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 60. English-language interview with Deden Nyima (pseudonym, female 23), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 61. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Yangzom (pseudonym, female 71), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 62. The following section is based on six interviews, the posters that they produced, and their website (http://yfbd.wordpress.com). In 2005 onwards, this group called itself the Youth for Better MPs, but changed its name in 2010 to Youth for Better Democracy since it now also worked on the PM campaigns. 63. According to one interlocutor, National Endowment for Democracy was ready to support the YFBD ahead of the 2011 campaigns, but YFBD could not agree to whether they should accept financial help. In the end, they decided to ‘stick to our own people, our own money’, Norbu Tashi explained. 64. Tibetan World, ‘10 Most Influential Personalities’, Tibetan World 6/3 (2007). 65. English-language interview with Norzin Wangmo (pseudonym, female 26), McLeod Ganj, October 2006 and Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29) McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 66. English-language interview with Norbu Tashi (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, October 2012. 67. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29) McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 68. The Tibetan alternative to YFBD was ‘Youth Volunteers for Promoting Democracy’ (mang gtso gong ‘phel ched na gzhon dang blangs). For the campaigns in 2006, the YBMPs called themselves in Tibetan ‘Youth Movement for Future Tibet’ (nyi ma gsar pa’i bod kyi na gzhon ‘khor lo). 69. Youth for Better MPs, Bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs skabs bcu bzhi pa’i spyi ‘thus kyi sngon ‘gro’i ‘os gzhi/ (Dharamsala, 2005); Youth for Better MPs, 14th Tibetan Assembly Election: Nominations for the Preliminary Poll (Dharamsala, 2005). 70. English-language interview with Norbu Tashi (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, October 2012. 71. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 72. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 73. E.g. Tenzin Tsundue, ‘Mangtso: Our Democratic Vision’, Tibetan Review 39/9 (2004). 74. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 75. Trine Brox, ‘“Vi ses i Tihar fængselet!” Ulydighed og patriotisme i Tibetan Youth Congress’, Tibet 24/75 (2009), pp. 3 – 9.

332

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176 –183

76. English-language interview with Tashi Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 22), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. 77. Alagappa, Civil Society, p. 37. 78. Ibid. 79. David Held, Models of Democracy (Cambridge, 2003). 80. Ibid., p. 316. 81. Jenkins, ‘Mistaking “Governance”’. 82. English-language interview with Tashi Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 22), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. 83. Frechette has analysed the effects that international assistance has on a local community, and concluded that it is never a free gift. Instead, it comes with ‘the expectation that local communities will transform in some way as to accommodate their patrons’ norms and values’. Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal, p. x. 84. Ibid., p. 150ff. 85. Edwards, Civil Society, p. 14. 86. Ibid., pp. 14 – 15. 87. Mosher, ‘Are Civil Societies’. 88. Julia Paley, ‘Toward an Anthropology of Democracy’, Annual Review of Anthropology 31 (2002), pp. 469– 96.

Chapter 4 A Place for Buddhism in Democracy? 1. Mark R. Thompson, ‘Whatever Happened to “Asian Values”?’, Journal of Democracy 12/4 (2001), pp. 154– 65. 2. Edward Friedman (ed.), The Politics of Democratization: Generalizing East Asian Experiences (Boulder, 1994). 3. See Jane Ardley, ‘Learning the Art of Democracy? Continuity and Change in the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’, Contemporary South Asia 12/3 (2003), pp. 349 – 63, and Stephanie Roemer, The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large (New York, 2008). 4. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Buddhism, Asian Values, and Democracy’, Journal of Democracy 10/1 (1999), pp. 3 – 7. 5. Nils Bubandt and Martijn van Beek, Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), p. 6. 6. Craig Calhoun, ‘Rethinking Secularism’, The Hedgehog Review 12/3 (2010), p. 48. 7. As discussed in the Introduction, translating chos into ‘religion’ or ‘Buddhism’ without careful reflection is problematic. That is also why many scholars, including myself, often prefer not to translate chos. 8. Ronald David Schwartz, ‘Renewal and Resistance: Tibetan Buddhism in the Modern Era’, in I. Harris (ed.), Buddhism and Politics in Twentieth-Century Asia (London, 1999). 9. Robert Barnett, ‘Mimetic Re-enchantment: The Contemporary Chinese State and Tibetan Religious Leadership’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds),

NOTES

10.

11.

12. 13. 14.

15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21.

22.

23. 24.

25. 26.

TO PAGES

183 –186

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Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012). Trine Brox, ‘Tibetansk kulturdiskurs: En undersøgelse og analyse af Dalai Lamas og de tibetanske eksilmyndigheders tibetansksprogede diskurs om kultur i a˚rene 1979–2002’, MA thesis in Tibetology, Københavns Universitet, 2003, p. 53ff. Trine Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan Way? Contesting Secularisms in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in S. Arslan and P. Schwieger (eds), Tibetan Studies: An Anthology (Anbieter, 2010). Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity (Stanford, 2003). Charles Taylor, ‘Modes of Secularism’, in R. Bhargava (ed.), Secularism and Its Critics (New Delhi, 2006 [1998]). Jose´ Casanova, ‘The Secular, Secularitizations, Secularisms’, in C.J. Calhoun, M. Juergensmeyer, and J. VanAntwerpen (eds), Rethinking Secularism (New York, 2011). Ibid., p. 54. Ibid., p. 55. Casanova, ‘The Secular, Secularitizations’, p. 61. Bubandt and van Beek, Varieties of Secularism. See Calhoun et al., Rethinking Secularism; Casanova, ‘The Secular, Secularitizations’; and Bubandt and van Beek, Varieties of Secularism. Arjun Appadurai, Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization (Minneapolis, 2003 [1996]). In reality, the periods in which a ‘regent’ (sde srid) ruled Tibet during the interregnum between two Dalai Lamas were in fact longer than the periods in which the Dalai Lamas ruled. The interregnum started after the passing of a Dalai Lama and continued during the minority of the subsequent Dalai Lama. See Luciano Petech, ‘The Dalai-Lamas and Regents of Tibet: A Chronological Study’, T’oung Pao: International Journal of Chinese Studies 47 (1959). The introduction to the structure and workings of the Tibetan Government pre-1951 are based on the works by Matthew T. Kapstein, ‘Government and Law’, The Tibetans (Malden, 2006); Luciano Petech, Aristocracy and Government in Tibet: 1728– 1959 (Roma, 1973); and especially: Melvyn C. Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, 1913– 1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State (New Delhi, 1993 [1989]). Goldstein, History of Modern Tibet, pp. 13– 14. Goldstein identified three different kinds of assemblies in modern Tibet (1913– 51), all of which consisted of monk and lay officials. At the two largest assemblies, representatives from outside the government were included, such as monastery representatives. These assemblies had no power to take action, so their position was merely advisory to the council. Ibid., pp. 19–20. Petech, Aristocracy and Government, p. 9. Ibid., pp. 8 –9.

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27. The three seats were like semi-autonomous cities within the Tibetan state. The monasteries were divided into colleges managing their own administration and resources. Drepung Monastery was the biggest of the three, housing around 10,000 monks: 7,000 monks resided in Sera Monastery and 3,300 in Ganden Monastery. See: Melvyn C. Goldstein, ‘Religious Conflict in the Traditional Tibetan State’, in L. Epstein and R.F. Sherburne (eds), Reflections on Tibetan Culture: Essays in Memory of Turrell V. Wylie (Lewiston, 1990), p. 234. Goldstein has pointed out that the monk officials usually had no loyalty to the colleges in which they were registered, and that they were looked upon with suspicion by ordinary monks who did not consider monk officials as real monks. See Goldstein, History of Modern Tibet, pp. 9 – 10. 28. Ibid., p. 8ff. 29. Chos srid zung ‘brel has alternatively been translated as ‘theocracy’, for instance by: Hortsang Jigme, ‘Bod kyi chos srid zung ‘brel lam lugs la phyi mig dang bsam gzhigs’, Nor mdzod 1 (2001), p. 28; Lobsang Sangay, ‘Democracy in Distress: Is Exile Polity a Remedy? A Case Study of Tibet’s Government in Exile’, SJD dissertation, Harvard University, 2004, and as ‘enlightened government’ by Ann Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization among Tibetans in Exile’, Journal of Asian Studies 66/1 (2007). As an institutionalised system (chos srid zung ‘brel gyi lam lugs), it has been called a ‘politico-religious institution’ by Dungkar Lobsang Thinley, The Merging of Religious and Secular Rule in Tibet (Beijing, 1991); and glossed as ‘a system in which the religious and secular are integrated’: Bod dbyin tshig mdzod chen mo: An Encyclopaedic Tibetan – English Dictionary (Beijing/London, 2001), p. 1133. A related and frequently used term is chos srid gnyis ldan, commonly translated as ‘religion and politics combined’ by Ronald David Schwartz, ‘Democracy, Tibetan Independence, and Protest under Chinese Rule’, The Tibet Journal 17/2 (1992), p. 8. Other Tibetan concepts referring to the intertwining of chos and srid are ‘twofold order’ (lugs gnyis), ‘twofold system’ (tshul gnyis), and ‘merged dual orders’ (lugs gnyis zung ldan). There is also the related oppositional pair ‘the sacred and the profane’ (chos dang ‘jig rten). ‘Religious rule’ (chos khrims) as opposed to ‘king’s rule’ (rgyal khrims) are terms used to designate spiritual authority and temporal power which are related to ‘merged spiritual law and politics.’ Among Tibetan-language articles and books dealing with chos srid zung ‘brel are Dungkar Lobsang Thinley, Bod kyi chos srid zung ‘brel skor bshad pa (Dharamsala, 1982); Lobsang Gyatso, Chos srid zung ‘brel la dpyad pa skal bzang sgo ‘byed bzhugs so/ (Dharamsala, 1991); ‘Chos srid zung ‘brel la dpyad pa’, Rigs slob dbu dge dam pa mkhas dbang blo bzang rgya mtsho’i gsung ‘bum/ phyogs sgrig (Dharamsala, 2003) and a whole issue of Nor mdzod (Vol. 1) (Sidhpur, 2001). 30. David Seyfort Ruegg, Ordre spirituel et ordre temporel dans la pense´e Bouddhique de l’Inde et du Tibet (Paris, 1995). 31. Parliament Proceedings, Spyi ‘thus lhan ‘dzoms kyi gsar gnas/ (Vol. 3) (Dharamsala, 1991), p. 12. The monk scholar Samdhong Rinpoche, who at the time of the debate was the speaker of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile, has

NOTES

32. 33. 34. 35. 36.

37.

38.

TO PAGES

187 –190

335

contributed to the debate regarding secularism and secularity while he has held various offices in the CTA. Samdhong Rinpoche (b. 1939, East Tibet) had been a monk in Drepung Monastery in Lhasa, and after fleeing to India, he served many significant religious and secular associations, inter alia, as a teacher of Buddhism in Tibetan lay schools, as the principal of Shimla Tibetan School and the Dalhousie Tibetan School in the 1960s. In the 1970s and 1980s, he was the principal of Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies (Varanasi) and its director until 2001. He has also had a long political career: He was one of the founders of the Tibetan Youth Congress (1970) and the speaker of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile (1991 – 2001), a parliamentarian especially appointed by the Dalai Lama (1991– 6), and the CTA prime minister (2001 –11). Additionally, Samdhong Rinpoche was a member of the committee that drafted the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile (1991) and also a member of the revision committee that drafted the amendments to it (2011). This biography of Samdhong Rinpoche has been assembled based on information found on the official CTA website www.tibet.net and NN, A Brief Biography of Prof. Samdhong Rinpoche (2014). Available at http:// samdhongrinpoche.com/en/an-brief-biography-of-prof-samdhong-rinpoche/ (accessed 21 August 2015). E.g. Dalai Lama XIV, Shes yon slob sbyong byed sgo’i skor (Vol. 1 [1959 – 1991]), pp. 65 – 6. Phuntsog Wangyal, ‘The Influence of Religion on Tibetan Politics’, The Tibet Journal 1/1, July/September (1975), p. 78. Tibetan-language interview with Choegon Rinpoche (male 38), Clement town, November 2006. Hortsang Jigme, ‘Bod kyi chos srid zung ‘brel lam lugs la phyi mig dang bsam gzhigs’, Nor mdzod 1 (2001), pp. 33, 26. Monasticism was a mass phenomenon in Tibet, but estimates of the percentage of monks in the male population vary greatly. Goldstein suggests that 26 per cent of all males were monks in 1733: Goldstein, ‘Religious Conflict’, p. 231. Samuel argues that a realistic number in pre-1950 Tibet was 10–12 per cent. Geoffrey Samuel, Civilized Shamans: Buddhism in Tibetan Societies (Washington, 1993), p. 309. Goldstein has explained that the large recruitment was partly due to the immense respect accorded to monkhood. Families would send a son (and to a lesser degree a daughter) to join monasteries, but a monastery could also recruit new monks as corve´e tax. Goldstein, ‘Religious Conflict’. There are several examples in Tibetan history of monastic colleges that took to arms to defend their political interests. Nevertheless, few Tibetans will point out this at times violent aspect of how chos and srid were implemented in Tibet. See Goldstein, ‘Religious Conflict’, regarding the clergy’s political involvement and intra-religious conflict. In his explanation of the relation between chos and srid, Tenzin Woebar interestingly also extended the term chos srid zung ‘brel from referring to an ideology of the government to refer to procedures within a monastery.

336

39. 40. 41.

42. 43.

44.

45.

46. 47. 48. 49. 50.

NOTES

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190 –194

He explained how ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ was at work when the monastery appoints new staff, because the procedure is to ‘combine man and deity’ (mi dang lha zung ‘brel byed). At a meeting they will nominate candidates for the posts – a selection done by man. The list of nominees is then presented to the deity. During prayers, monks were chosen by lot – selection by deity. Since it was the work of both man and deity, Tenzin Woebar concluded: ‘This is the way chos srid zung ‘brel works.’ Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Woebar (pseudonym, male 48), Bylakuppe, February 2007. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (‘char zin/) Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile (Draft) (Dharamsala, 1991), p. 1, emphasis added. Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bod mi mang spyi ‘thus kyi gros tshogs khag dang/ bka’ shag gis mtshon gzhung zhabs las byed par stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ (Vol. 2 [Speeches 1989– 1999]) (Dharamsala, 2001a), pp. 37– 55. Ibid., p. 47. E.g. Samdhong Rinpoche, ‘Secular tshig gi go don ‘grel phyogs/’, Slob dpon zam gdong rin po che mchog bod mi mang spyi ‘thus lhan tshogs skabs bcu gcig pa dang bcu gnyis pa’i tshogs gtso gnang skabs gros tshogs su bstsal ba’i gsung bshad dang lam ston gnad che khag phyogs bsdus/ (Delhi, 2003), p. 527. In a Tibetan context, communalism is a kind of factionalism stemming from regionalism and sectarianism. Examples of communal strife include the regionalism revealed in the conflict concerning the 13 self-excluded settlements and the discussions on sectarianism in the so-called Shugden controversy. Both conflicts are treated in Chapter 6 and also in: Trine Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan Demos in Exile’, Citizenship Studies 16/3–4 (2012), pp. 451–67. For details on communalism in India, cf. Partha Chatterjee, ‘History and the Nationalization of Hinduism’, Social Research 59/1 (1992) and Gyanendra Pandey, The Construction of Communalism in Colonial North India (New Delhi, 2006). This formulation of a common Tibetan identity disregards the Tibetan minorities who subscribe to no religion or who adhere to Islam (kha che’i chos), Christianity (ye shu’i chos) and Bon, the so-called indigenous religion of Tibet. Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Mineola, 2003 (1930)). Parliament Proceedings, Spyi ‘thus skabs bcu gcig/ gros tshogs dang po/ (Vol. 8) (Dharamsala, 1991a), p. 11. Ibid., p. 1ff. Tibetan-language interview with Namgyal Wangdu (male 71), Dekyiling, December 2006. Note that the Department of Religion and Culture (chos rig las khungs) is popularly called chos don lhan khang, i.e. ‘Council for Religious Affairs’. Until the late 1970s it was the Department of Religious Affairs (chos don las khungs) that catered to religious affairs, while secular Tibetan culture was handled in the Department of Education (shes rig lhan khang). Secular and religious affairs

NOTES

51. 52.

53. 54.

55.

56. 57. 58. 59. 60.

61. 62.

TO PAGES

194 –201

337

were later gathered under one department that changed the name to Department of Religion and Culture (chos rig lhan khang). Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan’. Article 3 in the final charter stated the same as above except that ‘secularism’ was replaced by ‘merged spiritual law and politics’ and that ‘the non-violence principle of the Buddha’s teachings’ was reduced to ‘the non-violence principle’. See: Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (Dharamsala, 1991), p. 1. English-language interview with Karma Choephel (male 58), Gangkyi, April 2007. In his SJD dissertation, the present prime-minister-in-exile Lobsang Sangay (2004: chapter 5) has unfolded how an ethics of democracy is inherent in Buddhism while at the same time pointing out several problems due to the lack of institutional secularisation of the CTA. He argued that this kind of nonsectarianism is able to make an institutional separation between the monastic institutions and state institutions, but not a separation of ‘spirituality from politics’. He also argued that the concept ris med distinguishes between the Dalai Lama as head of state (being a spiritual leader), but not head of government (being the political leader), which is the function of the prime minister. I relate this distinction between the Dalai Lama as a political and a religious authority in several chapters of this book and treat it at length in my article: Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55–74. Lobsang Sangay, ‘Mang tshogs kyis ‘os ‘dems byas pa’i bka’ khri skabs gsum pa’i las khur ‘go ‘dzugs kyi dam ‘bul gtam bshad/’, Shes bya 8 (2011), p. 31. English-language interview with Karma Choephel (male 58), Gangkyi, April 2007. English-language interview with Lhagpa Tsering (pseudonym, male 30), McLeod Ganj, November 2005. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Buddhism, Asian Values, and Democracy’; and Samdhong Rinpoche, ‘Democracy and Future Tibet’, in Selected Writings and Speeches: A Collection of Selected Writings and Speeches on Buddhism and Tibetan Culture by Prof. Samdhong Rinpoche (Sarnath, 1999). English-language interview with Tashi Tsetan (pseudonym, male 34), Dekyiling, November 2006. English-language interview with Chemey Yungdrung (male 31), McLeod Ganj, November 2006.

338

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202 –214

63. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Buddhism, Asian Values, and Democracy’, p. 4. 64. Tibetan-language interview with Yeshe Tsering (pseudonym, male 66), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 65. The Tibetan terms rinpoche and lama are titles applied to Buddhist teachers. A lama (‘superior’), the Indian equivalent to guru, designates the spiritual master or monk scholar. The title rinpoche (‘precious one’) is applied to the name of highly respected Buddhist teachers and is commonly used to address those who are recognised as reincarnated lamas. 66. English-language interview with Tashi Tsetan (pseudonym, male 34), Dekyiling, November 2006. 67. Martijn van Beek, ‘Enlightened Democracy: Normative Secularism and Spiritual Authority on the Margins of Indian Politics’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012). 68. Tibetan-language interview with Norbu Sampel (pseudonym, male 76), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 69. English-language interview with Karma Senge (pseudonym, male 52), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 70. English-language interview with Kunchok Tharchin (pseudonym, male 37), McLeod Ganj, November 2006. 71. English-language interview with Sonam Topgyal (pseudonym, male 39), Mussoorie, December 2006. 72. English-language interview with Norgye Tashi (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007. 73. Weber, The Protestant Ethic. 74. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 75. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 76. Taylor, ‘Modes of Secularism’. 77. English-language interview with Karma Choephel (male 58), Gangkyi, April 2007. 78. Taylor, ‘Modes of Secularism’. 79. Tibetan-language interview with Nyima Tashi (pseudonym, male 25), McLeod Ganj, November 2005. 80. Weber, The Protestant Ethic; Asad, Formations of the Secular; and Taylor, ‘Modes of Secularism’. 81. Asad, Formations of the Secular. 82. I have dealt with these different translations in a previous article: Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan’. 83. Nils Bubandt and Martijn van Beek, ‘Varieties of Secularism – in Asia and in Theory’, Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), p. 13.

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215 –221

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Chapter 5 ‘I Don’t Like Politics, But I Love My Country’ 1. Tibetan-language interview with Norzin Yudon (pseudonym, female 31), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 2. Alex Butler, Feminism, Nationalism and Exiled Tibetan Women (New Delhi, 2003), p. 98ff. 3. Yossi Shain, ‘Governments-in-Exile and International Legitimation’, Governments-in-Exile in Contemporary World Politics (New York, 1991), p. 224. 4. Ibid. 5. Russell J. Dalton, Doh C. Shin, and Willy Jou, ‘Understanding Democracy: Data from Unlikely Places’, Journal of Democracy 18/4 (2007), pp. 142 – 56. 6. See e.g. Alicia Phillips Mandaville and Peter P. Mandaville, ‘Introduction: Rethinking Democratization and Democracy Assistance’, Development 50/1 (2007), pp. 5 – 13. 7. Dalton et al., ‘Understanding Democracy’. 8. Kees van Kersbergen and Frans van Waarden, ‘“Governance” as a Bridge between Disciplines: Cross-Disciplinary Inspiration Regarding Shifts in Governance and Problems of Governability, Accountability and Legitimacy’, European Journal of Political Research 43/2 (2004). 9. Melvyn C. Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, 1913– 1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State (New Delhi, 1993 [1989]), pp. 19–22. 10. Trine Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan Demos in Exile’, Citizenship Studies 16/3 – 4 (2012), pp. 451–67. 11. These numbers were given to me by the Election Commission in 2007 and 2012. I do not know the voter turnout for the exile constituencies. The voter participation rates in 2006 according to regional adherence are as follows: Amdo 55.10 per cent, Kham 48.20 and Utsang 53.42. Within the different religious traditions: Bon 73.70 per cent, Gelug 40.71, Kagyu 61.24, Nyingma 71.70 and Sakya 72.81 per cent. Election Commission, Mi mang nas thad kar ‘os ‘dems byas pa’i bka’ khri skabs so so’i ‘dngos os bsdu chen mo’i skabs mi gzhung deb bkod dang/ dngos su ‘os ‘phen ji byung/ brgya cha bcas kyi re’u mig gsham gsal/ (Dharamsala, ND). 12. Jamyang Norbu, Waiting for Mangtso II: The Missing Piece of our Democracy Puzzle (2009). Available at http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2009/10/08/ waiting-for-mangtso-ii/ (accessed 21 August 2015), no pagination. 13. I have extracted these numbers from the IDEA Voter Turnout Database (http:// www.idea.int/vt/viewdata.cfm) consulted on 23 January 2015. 14. The Election Commission in Dharamsala monitors elections for MPs, prime minister, executive members of 63 branches of the Tibetan Freedom Movement, delegates for 25 local assemblies and four administrators. It is usually the administrators who act as regional election commissioners in the 62 permanent election offices. The Election Commission in Dharamsala announces the results of elections, but the ballots are counted locally in order to remove doubts regarding the results.

340

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15. English-language interview with Samten Chodon (pseudonym, female 36), McLeod Ganj, September 2012. 16. English-language interview with Karma Yeshi (male 37), Gangkyi, April 2007. 17. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 23), Delhi, April 2007. 18. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (Dharamsala, 2005), pp. 23–38. 19. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i ‘os bsdu’i sgrig gzhi (Dharamsala, 2005), pp. 29– 44. 20. Ibid. 21. Trine Brox, ‘“Vi ses i Tihar fængselet!” Ulydighed og patriotisme i Tibetan Youth Congress’, Tibet 24/75 (2009), pp. 3 – 9. 22. English-language interview with Pema Thinley (male 44), Delhi, April 2007. 23. English-language interview with Tsultrim Dorje (pseudonym, male 26), McLeod Ganj, November 2006. 24. English-language interview with Tsultrim Dorje (pseudonym, male 26), McLeod Ganj, November 2006. 25. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 23), Delhi, April 2007. 26. English-language interview with Pema Sangmo (pseudonym, female 37), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 27. English-language interview with Pema Sangmo (pseudonym, female 37), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 28. Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Democracy in Exile. 29. Ibid. 30. English-language interview with Samten Chodon (pseudonym, female 36), McLeod Ganj, September 2012. 31. English-language interview with Samten Chodon (pseudonym, female 36), McLeod Ganj, September 2012. 32. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Namgyal (pseudonym, male 64), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 33. English-language interview with Pema Thinley (male 44), Delhi, April 2007. 34. Tibetan-language interview with Gelek Gyatso (pseudonym, male 53), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 35. English-language interview with Lobsang Norbu (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007. 36. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Namgyal (pseudonym, male 64), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 37. English-language interview with Lobsang Norbu (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007. 38. English-language interview with Lobsang Norbu (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007.

NOTES

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39. Depending on which organisational bodies are present in the community, other agents (like the representatives of organisations, mutual-aid societies, neighbourhoods, or the CTA) can also take on the roles of counsellors, mediators and judges. 40. English-language interview with Lobsang Norbu (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007. 41. Tibetan-language interview with Tsering Namgyal (pseudonym, male 64), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 42. Plato, The Republic (Indianapolis, 1974), p. 145ff. 43. Andrew Heywood, Politics (Basingstoke, 2002 [1997]), p. 67. 44. Luciano Petech, Aristocracy and Government in Tibet: 1728 –1959 (Roma, 1973), pp. 8– 9. 45. Goldstein, A History of Modern Tibet, p. 8ff. 46. Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’. 47. Ann Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization among Tibetans in Exile’, Journal of Asian Studies 66/1 (2007), p. 108. 48. English-language interview with Sonam Topgyal (pseudonym, male 39), Mussoorie, December 2006. 49. Tibetan-language interview with Kesang Tsomo (pseudonym, female 43), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 50. Tibetan-language interview with Lhamo Yangchen (pseudonym, female 72), Bylakuppe, January 2007. 51. English-language interview with Sherab Sangpo (pseudonym, male 30), Gangkyi, March 2007. 52. English-language interview with Dorje Phuntsok (pseudonym, male 54), Bylakuppe, February 2007. 53. Chewang Ngokhang, Letter to the Editor: KT-2011 Initiative and Some Mumbojumbo (Expanded Version) (2010). Available at http://sites.google.com/site/ tibetanpoliticalreview/project-updates/kt-2011initiativeandsomemumbojumboexpandedversion (accessed 21 August 2015). 54. http://www.tibetanpoliticalreview.org/letters-to-the-editor/kt-2011initiati veandsomemumbo-jumbo. 55. Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55 – 74. 56. Jamyang Norbu, Waiting for Mangtso II. 57. Additionally, this layer (consisting of a virtual network of Tibetans) of the Tibetan society in exile exemplified how the Tibetan society in exile was not restricted to either Dharamsala centre or settlement periphery, but transcended the Dharamsala-settlement binary (cf. Chapter 3). 58. Phayul, Amendment in Kalon Tripa Election (2010). Available at http://www. phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼26939 (accessed 21 August 2015).

342

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59. Phayul, Amending Charter for Individual Undemocratic, Says Kalon Tripa (2009). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼ 24966&t ¼ 1 (accessed 21 August 2015). 60. Historically, the prime ministers of the Ganden Phodrang government who had ruled Tibet from Lhasa were elected by the Dalai Lama. However, since 2001, the prime minister had been directly elected by the Tibetan exile populace. According to article 21.3 of the Charter of the Tibetans-in-Exile, the candidate must be a citizen of Tibet, minimum 35 years old, not mentally ill, not bankrupt, not criminal, not involved in dangerous foreign affiliations and not disqualified by the Tibetan parliament-in-exile or previously removed as prime minister. Finally, the charter bars a candidate from serving more than two consecutive terms of five years each. 61. Thubten Samdup, Electing the Next Kalon Tripa: The Urgency of New Leadership (2008). Available at http://www.kalontripa.org/ktenglish.html (accessed 19 October 2010, nonfunctioning link 21 August 2015). 62. Personal communication, April 2009. 63. Several initiatives on the internet are worth mentioning in this regard, such as the initiative ‘Katri 2011: Change & Choice – A Necessity!’ on the internet site www.KalonTripa.org and on the social forum Facebook; Bod Gyalo (‘Victory to Tibet’) information platform at http://media.bodgyalo.com/ kalon_tripa.html; the National Democratic Party of Tibet’s social forum (http://2011campaign.ndp4tibet.org/) and Facebook campaign driven with slogans like ‘A Better Mangtso [democracy] For Free Tibet’ and ‘His Holiness The Dalai Lama Blessed Us with Democracy and it is Our Duty to Participate and Vote’. There were also internet campaigns, most notably for the two major candidates on Facebook, ‘Lobsang Sangay for Kalon Tripa 2011,’ ‘Vote for Tenzin Namgyal Tethong,’ and ‘Friends of Kasur Tenzin Namgyal Tethong lak’. Their campaigns also had their own internet sites: The initiative www. kalontripafortibet.org endorsed Lobsang Sangay; and www.kalontripa2011. org endorsed the candidacy of Tenzin Namgyal Tethong. Though the activity on the internet reflected a high level of engagement and debate ahead of elections to an extent that had never been seen before, one must remember that it was far from every Tibetan who had access to and used the internet to inform themselves on politics. See: Bhuchung K. Tsering, Tibetans and the Kalon Tripa Election: Putting the Cart Before the Horse? (2010). Available at http://sites.google. com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/project-updates/tibetansandthekalontripa electionputtingthecartbeforethehorse (accessed 21 August 2015). 64. Jamyang Norbu, Waiting for Mangsto: A Reality Check of Tibetan Exile Politics (2009). Available at http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2009/09/09/waitingfor-mangtso/ (accessed 21 August 2015). 65. Ibid. 66. Bhuchung K. Tsering, If You Desire Change in Tibetan Politics, Look to the Parliament, not the Kalon Tripa (2010). Available at http://www.tibetanpolitical

NOTES

67. 68. 69.

70.

71. 72. 73. 74.

75.

76.

77. 78. 79.

80.

81.

82.

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review.com/project-updates/ifyoudesirechangeintibetanpoliticslooktothe parliamentnotthekalontripa (accessed 21 August 2015). English-language interview with Gendun Gyatso (pseudonym, male 49), McLeod Ganj, September 2012. Cf. Gendun Rabsel, Bod kyi O bha ma/ yang na/ rgya nag gi O bha ma/ (2010). Available at http://www.khabdha.org/?p¼10585 (accessed 21 August 2015). Jamyang Norbu, Some Thoughts on the Upcoming Kalon Tripa Elections (2010). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼ 28303&t ¼ 1 (accessed 21 August 2015). Tenzin W. Loden, Impossible is Possible or Realistically Unrealistic! (2010). Available at http://www.tibetanpoliticalreview.org/project-updates/impossi bleispossibleorrealisticallyunrealistic (accessed 21 August 2015). Gendun Rabsel, Bod kyi O bha ma. Jamyang Norbu, Waiting for Mangtso II. Bhuchung K. Tsering, Tibetans and the Kalon. Tibetan Political Review, Personality v. Policy (2010). Available at http://sites. google.com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/project-updates/personalityvpolicy (accessed 22 August 2015). However, when the electorate actually asked candidates to present their policies, they avoided answering the question: Tibetan Political Review, Missing the Big Picture? A Comment on Lobsang Sangay’s ‘Kalon Tripa Election Reform’ (2010). Available at http://sites.google. com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/project-updates/missingthebigpictureacomm entonlobsangsangayskalontripaelectionreform (accessed 22 August 2015). A few candidates did publish their elections manifesto, some in English (e.g. Tenzin Namgyal Tethong), and some in Tibetan (e.g. Phurbu Dorjee). He discussed this in: Lobsang Sangay, ‘Democracy in Distress: Is Exile Polity a Remedy? A Case Study of Tibet’s Government in Exile’, SJD dissertation, Harvard University, 2004, ch. 6; see also this volume, Chapter 6. Tibetan Political Review, Reflections on the Tethong/Sangay Debate, Zurich (2010). Available at http://sites.google.com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/projectupdates/reflectionsonthetethongsangaydebatezurich (accessed 22 August 2015). Ibid. Tibetan Political Review, Missing the Big Picture? See for instance Tibetan Political Review, Letters to the Editor (2013– 14). Available at http://sites.google.com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/letters-to-theeditor (accessed 22 August 2015). Tibetan Political Review, Youth v. Experience (2010). Available at http://sites. google.com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/project-updates/youthvexperience (accessed 20 August 2015). Phayul, Youth Group Launches Campaign Website for Lobsang Sangay (2010). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼27958 (accessed 22 August 2015). Tibetan Political Review, Youth v. Experience.

344

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83. Phayul, Amending Charter for Individual. 84. The Guardian, Dalai Lama will See Resolution to ‘Tibet Problem’ in Lifetime, Says Exiles (2010). Available at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/05/ dalai-lama-tibet-resolution-china (accessed 22 August 2015). 85. On this day, armed Nepalese police confiscated ballot boxes in Kathmandu, Nepal, thus interfering in the casting of votes by nearly 9,000 Tibetans. See report: International Campaign for Tibet, Nepalese Police Seize Ballot Boxes from Tibetan Exile Election (2010). Available at http://www.savetibet.org/nepalesepolice-seize-ballot-boxes-from-tibetan-exile-election/ (accessed 22 August 2015). 86. Phayul, Dr Lobsang Sangay Holds Strong Lead in Preliminary Polls (2010). Available at http://drichu17.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼28545&article ¼ Dr þ Lobsang þ Sangay þ holds þ strong þ lead þ in þ preliminary þ polls (accessed 22 August 2015). 87. Election Commission, 2010 Kalon Tripa Preliminary Election Result (2010). Available at http://tibet.net/en/index.php?id¼ ann&annid ¼ 34&tab ¼ 7 (accessed 12 November 2010, nonfunctioning link 22 August 2015). 88. The only female candidate, Gyari Dolma, received 2,733 votes, Tashi Wangdi 2,101 votes, Lobsang Jinpa 1,545 votes, and Khorlatsang Sonam Topgyal 605 votes, ibid. 89. Phayul, Leading Kalon Tripa Candidates Declare Candidacy for Final Elections (2010). Available at www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼28570&article ¼ Leading þ Kalon þ Tripa þ candidates þ declare þ candidacy þ for þ final þ elections&t¼1&c¼1 (accessed 22 August 2015). 90. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas gsum bcu’i dus dran thengs 52 pa’i thog yongs khyab tu btsal ba’i gsung ‘phrin/’, Shes bya 3 (2011). For a critique of the Dalai Lama’s decision and the bad timing of his announcement, see the blog post by Jamyang Norbu: Resolving the Dalai Lama Resignation Crisis (2011). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article. aspx?id¼ 29312&article ¼ Resolving þ the þ Dalai þ Lama þ resignation þ crisis%3a þ Jamyang þ Norbu&t ¼ 1&c ¼ 1 (accessed 22 August 2015). As related in Chapter 1, the Dalai Lama devolved his power in order to retire from political office completely, which also meant that the Charter of the Tibetansin-Exile was amended in order to transfer all political powers of the Dalai Lama to the parliament and the prime minister. See Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Democracy in Exile, p. 30. 91. These numbers were given to me by the Election Commission in 2007 and 2012. 92. Election Commission, Election Commission Releases Final Result of Election (2011). Available at http://tibet.net/2011/04/27/election-commission-releases -final-result-of-election/ (accessed 22 August 2015). 93. CTA, Tibetans Elect Dr Lobsang Sangay as Kalon Tripa (2011). Available at http://tibet.net/2011/04/27/tibetans-elect-dr-lobsang-sangay-as-kalon-tripa/ (accessed 22 August 2015).

NOTES TO PAGES 251 – 254

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94. English-language interview with Gendun Gyatso (pseudonym, male 49), McLeod Ganj, September 2012. 95. Ibid. 96. My translation from the Tibetan original Dalai Lama XIV, ‘Spyi nor gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog gis bka’ khri skabs gsum pa’i khri ‘don mdzad sgor stsal ba’i bka’ slob/’, Shes bya 8 (2011), p. 29. In another translation, an official CTA presentation of srid skyong Lobsang Sangay, the comparison was twisted slightly different, not as an old office transferred to the twenty-first century, but relating how the Dalai Lama had received his political office at the age of 16 from the elderly regent, and now the youthful Lobsang Sangay had been given this political power from an elderly Dalai Lama. The CTAtranslation read: ‘When I was young, an elderly regent Takdrag Rinpoche handed over Sikyong (political leadership) to me, and today I am handing over Sikyong to young Lobsang Sangay’: CTA, Present Kalons (2015). Available at http://tibet.net/about-cta/executive/ (accessed 22 August 2015). 97. Dalai Lama XIV, ‘bka’ khri skabs gsum pa’, p. 28. 98. Ibid., p. 29. 99. Phayul, Tibetan Parliament Changes ‘Kalon Tripa’ to ‘Sikyong’ (2012). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼32159 (accessed 22 August 2015). Forging this link was a mixed success. Jamyang Norbu had once complained in a blog post that the title bka’ blon khris pa literally means ‘the enthroned minister’. It bothered him because there should be no throne in a democracy except for the Dalai Lama’s golden throne at the Potala Palace in Lhasa. Except for royalty, there should only be chairs in a democracy, he argued. At the time, Jamyang Norbu suggested that Tibetans should use the term srid blon as the Tibetan equivalent for ‘prime minister’. See Jamyang Norbu, Further Musings on the Upcoming Elections (2010). Available at http:// www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2010/10/18/further-musings-on-the-upcomi ng-elections/ (accessed 22 August 2015). When the parliament decided to adopt the term srid skyong, Jamyang Norbu objected that it was not a simple name change. Instead, the new srid skyong was the elected leader by Tibetan exile populace, but also the political successor of the Dalai Lama which meant that he headed both government and state. He argued that it was more appropriate, albeit not desirable, to call such a leader ‘president’ like they do in e.g. the United States. Jamyang Norbu, Tibet’s Next Incarnation? (2013). Available at http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2013/ 04/22/%e2%80%9ctibet%e2%80%99s-next-incarnation/ (accessed 22 August 2015).

Chapter 6 Freedom Struggle over Democracy 1. Yossi Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty: Political Exiles in the Age of the Nation-State (Middletown, 1989), p. 15.

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2. Ibid.; Yossi Shain, ‘Governments-in-Exile and International Legitimation’, in Governments-in-Exile in Contemporary World Politics (New York, 1991). 3. Ibid. 4. Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty; and ‘Governments-in-Exile’. 5. Benedict Anderson, ‘Long-distance Nationalism: Nationalism, Southeast Asia, and the World’, in The Spectre of Comparisons (London, 1998). 6. Lobsang Sangay, ‘Democracy in Distress’, SJD dissertation, Harvard University, 2004, ch. 6. 7. Ibid., p. 4. 8. Ibid., p. 12. 9. Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty, p. 25. 10. English-language interview with Sonam Topgyal (pseudonym, male 39), Mussoorie, December 2006. 11. Trine Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan Demos in Exile’, Citizenship Studies 16/3–4 (2012). 12. Anderson, ‘Long-distance Nationalism’. 13. Tibetan-language interview with Yeshe Tarchin (pseudonym, male 76), Dekyiling, December 2006. 14. Trine Brox, ‘Tibetan Culture as Battlefield: How the Term “Tibetan Culture” is Utilized as a Political Strategy’, in L. Schmithausen (ed.), Buddhismus in Geschichte und Gegenwart: Gewalt und Gewaltlosigkeit im Buddhismus (Hamburg, 2006). 15. Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’. 16. Cf. Yossi Shain and Ariel I. Ahram, ‘The Frontiers of Loyalty: Do They Really Change?’, Orbis 47/4 (2003). 17. Tibetan-language interview with Yeshe Tarchin (pseudonym, male 76), Dekyiling, December 2006. 18. English-language interview with Norzin Wangmo (pseudonym, female 26), McLeod Ganj, October 2006. 19. Editorial, ‘From the Desk’, Tibetan World 2/2 (2005). 20. English-language interview with Trinle Chodon (pseudonym, male 23), Delhi, April 2007. 21. Tashi Phuntsok, ‘On Tibetan Parliamentary Democracy’, Rangzen 20/3 (1995), p. 19. 22. Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty. 23. English-language interview with Karma Yeshi (male 37), Gangkyi, April 2007. 24. English-language interview with Sherab Sangpo (pseudonym, male 30), Gangkyi, March 2007. 25. Jane Ardley, ‘Learning the Art of Democracy? Continuity and Change in the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’, Contemporary South Asia 12/3 (2003); Carole McGranahan, ‘Truth, Fear, and Lies: Exile Politics and Arrested Histories of the Tibetan Resistance’, Cultural Anthropology 10/4 (2005); Jan Magnusson, ‘How Tibetans Deal With Political Conflicts in Exile: The National

NOTES

26.

27. 28.

29. 30. 31. 32. 33.

34.

35.

36. 37.

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Democratic Party of Tibet Enters Exile Politics’, Working paper 5 (A˚rhus, 1998); and Fiona McConnell, ‘De facto, Displaced, Tacit: The sovereign Articulations of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’, Political Geography 28/6 (2009). See for communalism: Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’; and polyvocality: Trine Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political from the Religious: Secularisation and Democratisation in the Tibetan Community in Exile’, in N. Bubandt and M. van Beek (eds), Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations of Religion, Politics, and the Spiritual (London, 2012), pp. 55 –74. Partha Chatterjee, ‘History and the Nationalization of Hinduism’, Social Research 59/1 (1992). One early example of the Dalai Lama’s concern is his speech to Tibetans from Amdo in 1978: Dalai Lama XIV, Srid zhi’i rnam ‘dren gong sa skyabs mgon chen po mchog nas/ bud med tshogs pa dang/ gzhon nus mtshon/ tshogs pa khag la stsal ba’i bka’ slob phyogs bsdebs bzhugs so/ [Speeches 1964– 1998] (Dharamsala, 2001), p. 90. English-language interview with Karma Yeshi (male 37), Gangkyi, April 2007. English-language interview with Norgye Tashi (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007. English-language interview with Tsultrim Dorje (pseudonym, male 26), McLeod Ganj, November 2006. Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political’. See for instance: Jamyang Norbu, After the Dalai Lama (2002). Available at http://www.newsweek.com/after-dalai-lama-146757 (accessed 22 August 2015). Jamyang Norbu, Tibet’s Next Incarnation? (2013). Available at http://www.jam yangnorbu.com/blog/2013/04/22/%e2%80%9ctibet%e2%80%99s-nextincarnation/ (accessed 22 August 2015). Dalai Lama XIV, Special Message of HH the Dalai Lama for Tibetans In and Outside Tibet (2008). Available at http://www.dalailama.com/news/post/ 276-special-message-of-hh-the-dalai-lama-for-tibetans-in-and-outside-tibet (accessed 22 August 2015); Clarifications on H.H. the Dalai Lama’s Remarks (2008). Available at http://www.dalailama.com/news/post/273-clarificationson-hh-the-dalai-lamas-remarks (accessed 22 August 2015); His Holiness Calls for Special General Meeting on Tibet (2008). Available at http:// tibet.net/2008/09/his-holiness-calls-for-special-general-meeting-on-tibet/ (accessed 22 August 2015); ‘Bod phyi nang du ‘khod pa’i bod rigs yongs la gong sa skyabs mgon chen po’i dmigs bsal gsung ‘phrin/’, Shes bya 11 (2008). English-language interview with Pema Dolma (pseudonym, female 37), McLeod Ganj, October 2012. Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty, p. 38.

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38. Charles Taylor, ‘Modes of Secularism’, in R. Bhargava (ed.), Secularism and Its Critics (New Delhi, 2006 [1998]), p. 44. 39. Some Tibetans (individuals, organisations, schools and monasteries) have received help from the MTAC in Taiwan, but few were willing to admit to receiving this help because of a strong moral stigma in the Tibetan exile community. See: Ann Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal: The Dynamics of International Assistance among a Community in Exile (New York, 2002), p. 7. Receiving aid from the MTAC has been viewed by many Tibetans as the same as accepting Taiwan’s stance on Tibet as an integral part of China, and it has also been interpreted as showing loyalty towards Taiwan and disloyalty towards the Dalai Lama. Ibid., p. 19. Many Tibetans understand the MTAC to be an agent provocateur exploiting the Tibetans-in-exile, and the parliament passed a resolution in July 1994 forbidding any contact between the Tibetans and the MTAC. Today, however, the CTA and the Dalai Lama deal openly with Taiwan. Compare with Tsering Namgyal, ‘The Twisting Saga of Tibet – Taiwan Relations’, Tibetan Review 38/6 (2003); and Tibetan Review editorials, articles and letters to the editor for discussions on scandals involving the MTAC, for instance the issue 25 from 1990. 40. The ‘13 Settlements’ is the popular name of the Tibetan Welfare Association that has caused and still causes a lot of grievance in the exile-Tibetan society. It developed their own settlements and policies, resisted guidelines and reforms emerging from Dharamsala, refused to pay the so-called voluntary tax to the CTA (until the 1980s), and in protest applied for Indian citizenship, thereby not only defying Dharamsala rule, but also questioning its legitimacy. See: Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’, p. 460. 41. Chusi Gangdruk, once the East Tibetan guerrilla movement fighting Chinese aggressors, has developed into a regional association and mutualaid society with political interests, and is today strongly associated with the Khampas of eastern Tibet. It has been involved in several political controversies, and for instance in relation to the disarmament of the Nepal-based Tibetan guerrillas in 1974: ‘Militant, Nationalist Movement’, Tibetan Review 9/6 – 7 (1974); Dawa Norbu, ‘Who Aided Khampas and Why?’, Tibetan Review 6 – 7 (1974). Twenty years later Chusi Gangdrug leaders signed an agreement with the MTAC. This caused a scandal that split the organisation in two and also led to violent clashes, especially in Delhi and in Bylakuppe: ‘Exile Community Faced with Another Controversy’, Tibetan Review 29/7 (1994). One faction became ‘the old Chusi Gangdrug’ and is apparently supported and guided by the MTAC. The other faction, known as ‘the new Chusi Gangdrug’ is recognised by the CTA and presumably guided by it as well. See: ‘The Writing on the Wall’, Tibetan Review 30/1 (1995). Compare with Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal, p. 164ff.; and articles in Tibetan Review: e.g. ‘Playing into their hands?’, Tibetan Review 29/7 (1994); ‘The Writing on

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the Wall’; ‘Dharamsala Withdraws Recognition to Chusi Gangdrug’, Tibetan Review 9 (1994); ‘Exile Community Faced With Another Controversy’, Tibetan Review 29/7 (1994); ‘Khampa Quarrel Brought to Court’, Tibetan Review 30/1 (1995). 42. When the so-called Shugden controversy escalated in 1996, the Tibetan society was split into a majority who followed the Dalai Lama’s order to abandon the worship of this deity and a minority who upheld their Shugden worship. Many Tibetans abandoned their Shugden practice as a proof of their loyalty towards the Dalai Lama, and among those who did not, several worshippers were verbally and physically abused by fellow exiles. See: Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’, p. 456. Apparently it even led to the murder of the principal of the Buddhist Dialectic Institute in Dharamsala who was an opponent to Shugden worship. See: Gareth Sparham, ‘Who Killed Lobsang Gyatso?’, Tibetan Review 33/2 (1998). For more information, refer to Georges Dreyfus, ‘The Shuk-den Affair: History and Nature of a Quarrel’, Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 21/2 (1998); and Martin A. Mills, ‘Charting the Shugden Interdiction in the Western Himalaya’, in J. Bray and E. De Rossi Filibeck (eds), Mountains, Monasteries and Mosques (Pisa, 2009). It is also interesting to note that the opponents in this conflict systematically invoke the democracy discourse to de-legitimise the opponent: anti-Shugden argumentation accuses Shugden worshippers of forming a fundamentalist cult engaged in reversing the Tibetans’ democratisation process in order to re-install theocratic governance and work against freedom of religion. See: Department of Religion and Culture, ‘Dorje Shugden Versus Pluralism and National Unity’, in The Worship of Shugden: Documents Related to a Tibetan Controversy (Dharamsala, 1998). Pro-Shugden argumentation claims that Shugden worshippers are victims of religious persecution orchestrated by an autocratic and intolerant Dalai Lama who proved himself to be far from a democratic leader. The most rabid accusations emerged from the London-based Western Shugden Society (www.western shugdensociety.org). 43. The sectarian struggle over the recognition and authenticity of the seventeenth Karmapa, the head of the Karma Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, is probably the best-known conflict outside of the Tibetan society. After the sixteenth Karmapa Rangjung Rigpe Dorje died in 1981, two candidates, Urgyen Trinley Dorje and Trinley Thaye Dorje, were put forward as his reincarnation. Immediately, the factions in Rumtek clashed in violent encounters. See: Lea Terhune, Karmapa: The Politics of Reincarnation (Boston, 2004); ‘Karmapa Incarnation Discovered in Kham’, Tibetan Review 27/7 (1992). While the Dalai Lama supported and recognised one of the candidates, Urgyen Trinley Dorje who is now residing outside of Dharamsala, this has not deterred the rival faction from grooming their own candidate and thereby defying the Dalai Lama. Both candidates ended

350

44. 45. 46.

47.

48. 49.

50.

51.

52. 53.

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up being enthroned as the seventeenth Karmapa by rival factions, and today they are working in the function as the head of the Karma Kagyu sect with the various monasteries supporting one or the other candidate. The conflict has left deep wounds in Tibetan society, and points towards how the Dalai Lama has not been able to unite every Tibetan under his political and spiritual authority. Alicja Iwan´ska, Exiled Governments: Spanish and Polish (Cambridge, 1981); and Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty. Ibid.; Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’. Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal; and Dorsh Marie DeVoe, ‘Survival of a Refugee Culture: The Longterm Gift Exchange Between Tibetans Refugees and Donors in India’, PhD Thesis, University of California, 1983. DeVoe, ‘Survival of a Refugee’, p. 158; John F. Avedon, In Exile from the Land of Snows: The Dalai Lama and Tibet since the Chinese Conquest (New Delhi, 1997 [1979]), p. 126. Frechette, Tibetans in Nepal, p. 151. Featured in the Tibetan Political Review were, for instance: Woser and Lobsang Sangay Discuss ‘Unity’ and the Freedom to Criticize (2012). Available at http:// www.tibetanpoliticalreview.org/editorials/woserandlobsangsangaydiscussuni tyandthefreedomtocriticize (accessed 22 August 2015); Are the Speaker and Kalon Tripa Stifling Free Speech? (2012). Available at https://sites.google.com/ site/tibetanpoliticalreview/editorials/arethespeakerandkalontripastiflingfree speech (accessed 22 August 2015); Tibetan Democracy Takes a Step Backwards (2013). Available at https://sites.google.com/site/tibetanpoliticalreview/ editorials/tibetandemocracytakesastepbackwards (accessed 22 August 2015); The Speaker and the Kalon Tripa Respond to the Free Speech Suppression Controversy (2012). Available at http://www.tibetanpoliticalreview.org/editorials/thespeaker andthekalontriparespondtothefreespeechsuppressioncontroversy (accessed 22 August 2015). Jamyang Norbu wrote several pieces: Waiting for Mangsto: A Reality Check of Tibetan Exile Politics; Waiting for Mangtso II: The Missing Piece of our Democracy Puzzle; Waiting for Mangtso III: One Small Step for Democracy. . . (2010). Available at http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2010/03/22/waiting-formangtso-iii/ (accessed 22 August 2015); Ending to Begin (part I); The Sad Painful Joke of Tibetan Democracy (2013). Available at http://www.jamyangnorbu. com/blog/2013/10/31/the-sad-painful-joke-of-tibetan-democracy/ (accessed 22 August 2015); as well as Tibet’s Next Incarnation? Woeser, On ‘Petty Criticism’, ‘Trivial Matters’ and ‘Establishing Authority’ (2012). Available at http://highpeakspureearth.com/2012/on-petty-criticismtrivial-matters-and-establishing-authority-by-woeser/ (accessed 22 August 2015). Ibid., no pagination. Tibetan Political Review, Woser and Lobsang Sangay; Tibetan Political Review, Are the Speaker; Tibetan Political Review, The Speaker and the Kalon Tripa.

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351

54. CTA, Parliament Session Begins Amid Crisis in Tibet (2012). Available at http:// tibet.net/2012/09/14/tibetan-parliament-session-begins-amid-crisis-in-tibet/ (accessed 22 August 2015). 55. Tibetan Political Review, The Speaker and the Kalon Tripa, no pagination. 56. Jamyang Norbu, ‘Opening the Political Eye: Tibet’s Long Search for Democracy’, Shadow Tibet: Selected Writings 1989 to 2004 (New Delhi, 2006), p. 20. 57. Lhasang Tsering had been a member of the CIA-trained Tibetan guerrilla force based in Mustang, later becoming the president of the Tibetan Youth Congress, and has also held offices in the CTA. Pema Bhum had been an associate professor of Tibetan literature at the Northwest Minority Institute in Lanzhou, China and escaped to Dharamsala in 1988. Jamyang Norbu had served different posts in the CTA and was the director of the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts in 1979– 84. Tashi Tsering worked as a researcher at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives, and was the author and editor of several works on Tibetan history. 58. Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, Btsan byol bod mi’i bca’ khrims/ (Dharamsala, 1991). 59. Jamyang Norbu, Waiting for Mangsto. 60. Jamyang Norbu is today living ‘in exile from exile’ in the United States. He is the author of the popular blog Shadow Tibet (http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/). 61. Tenzin Tsundue, The Untouchables of Dharamsala (2011). Available at http:// www.phayul.com/news/tools/print.aspx?id¼29310&t ¼ 1 (accessed 22 August 2015). 62. Jamyang Norbu, After the Dalai Lama. 63. Brox, ‘Unyoking the Political’. 64. Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty. 65. See for instance Lobsang Sangay, ‘Mang tshogs kyis ‘os ‘dems byas pa’i bka’ khri skabs gsum pa’i las khur ‘go ‘dzugs kyi dam ‘bul gtam bshad/’, Shes bya 8 (2011), p. 33. The last item in his slogan, rang kha rang gso, which he translated as ‘self-reliance’, is also interesting. I have heard the idiom before in connection with explanations of why Tibetans prefer to settle disputes and solve problems locally instead of going outside their community to seek help. In Tibetan it was expressed as kha nang na kha nang gso, which means that if you have a sore in the mouth it must be healed in the mouth. 66. Ibid., p. 34. 67. Phayul, A Year in Office, Kalon Tripa Issues Letter of Progress (2012). Available at http://www.phayul.com/news/article.aspx?id¼ 31857 (accessed 22 August 2015). 68. Brox, ‘Constructing a Tibetan’. 69. Shain, The Frontier of Loyalty, p. 44ff. 70. Stephanie Roemer, The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large (New York, 2008). 71. Ibid., p. 99.

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72. Ibid. 73. Self-immolations have been interpreted as both religious and political acts. See for instance: Dhondup Tashi Rekjong, Online Debates among Tibetans in Exile (2012). Available at http://www.culanth.org/fieldsights/112-online-debatesamong-tibetans-in-exile (accessed 22 August 2015); and Robert Barnett, ‘Political Self-Immolation in Tibet: Causes and Influences’, Revue d’Etudes Tibetaines 25 (2012). See the special issues of Cultural Anthropology, ‘SelfImmolation as Protest in Tibet’ April (2012), and Revue d’Etudes Tibe´taines, ‘Tibet is burning. Self-Immolation: Ritual or Political Protest?’ December (2012) for analysis, and the internet database by International Campaign for Tibet, Self-immolations by Tibetans (2015). Available at http://www.savetibet.org/ resources/fact-sheets/self-immolations-by-tibetans/ (accessed 21 August 2015). 74. International Campaign for Tibet, Harrowing Images and Last Message from Tibet of First Lama to Self-Immolate (2012). Available at http://www.savetibet. org/harrowing-images-and-last-message-from-tibet-of-first-lama-to-selfimmolate/ (accessed 22 August 2015), no pagination. 75. Ibid. 76. Trine Brox, ‘“Vi ses i Tihar fængselet!” Ulydighed og patriotisme i Tibetan Youth Congress’, Tibet 24/75 (2009), pp. 3 – 9. 77. CTA, Thousands Attend Funeral of Jampel Yeshi in Dharamsala (2012). Available at http://tibet.net/2012/03/30/thousands-attend-funeral-of-jampel-yeshi-indharamsala/ (accessed 22 August 2015). 78. Cameron David Warner, ‘Hope and Sorrow: Uncivil Religion, Tibetan Music Videos, and YouTube’, Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology 78/4 (2013); Woeser, What Kinds of Songs are ‘Reactionary Songs’ (2009). Available at http://highpeaks pureearth.com/2009/what-kinds-of-songs-are-reactionary-songs-by-woeser/ (accessed 22 August 2015). 79. The first verse is about the ‘kind lama’ (bla ma bzang po), the wish-fulfilling jewel (yid bzhin nor bu) – a reference to the Dalai Lama – singing that he wants to go and see him: ‘Sitting on the golden throne. He is the protector of the Tibetan people. Let’s go and see the wish-fulfilling jewel’ (bzhugs yod gser gyi khri la bzhugs yod/ bod mi’i skyabs mgon red/ rgyal ba yid bzhin nor bu mjal du ‘gro/). The second verse is about the ‘kind leader’ (dpon po bzang po) of Tibet, Lobsang Sangay, with whom the Tibetans can share their experiences: ‘Sitting on the silver throne. He is the leader of Tibet. Let’s go and tell him the joys and sorrows of Tibetan people’ (bzhugs yod dngul gyi khri la bzhugs yod/ bod kyi dpon po red/ kha ba bod mi’i skyid sdug zhu ru ‘gro/). In the third verse about the ‘kind people’ (mi rigs bzang po), Phuljung appeal to Tibetans to unite and to protect their collective identity as Tibetans by speaking pure Tibetan – a recurrent Tibetan theme since 2010. Cf. Franc oise Robin, ‘Streets, Slogans, and Screens: New Paradigms for the Defense of the Tibetan Language’, in T. Brox and I. Belle´r-Hann (eds), On the Fringes of the Harmonious Society: Tibetans and Uyghurs in Socialist China (Copenhagen, 2014). He sings: ‘Speaking the pure

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Father tongue. They are the kind people. Let’s pledge our unity by joining hands’ ( pha skad gtsang ma bshad pa’i/ mi rigs bzang po red/ mthun sgril lag gdang byed pa’i dam bca’ yod/). This translation is based upon the transcribed lyrics in the song’s music video with additional translations and comments released by High Peaks Pure Earth, A Song by Phuljung: ‘Kind Lama’ (2012). Available at http://highpeakspureearth.com/2012/a-song-by-phuljung-kind-lama/ (accessed 22 August 2015). Warner, ‘Hope and Sorrow’. Ibid., p. 545. Ibid., p. 543. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Lhamo (pseudonym, female 39), McLeod Ganj, October 2012.

Postscript 1. Reinhardt Koselleck, ‘A Response to Comments on the Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe’, in H. Lehmann and M. Richter (eds), The Meaning of Historical Terms and Concepts: New Studies on Besgrieffsgeschichte (Washington, 1996). 2. Jan-Ulrich Sobisch and Trine Brox, ‘Translations of Human Rights: Tibetan Contexts’, in C. Meinert and H.-B. Zo¨llner (eds), Buddhist Approaches to Human Rights: Dissonances and Resonances (Bielefeld, 2010). 3. I have studied these translations in several publications, on human rights (ibid.), culture: Trine Brox, ‘Tibetan Culture as Battlefield: How the Term “Tibetan Culture” is Utilized as a Political Strategy’, in L. Schmithausen (ed.), Buddhismus in Geschichte und Gegenwart: Gewalt und Gewaltlosigkeit im Buddhismus (Hamburg, 2006); democracy: Trine Brox, ‘Democracy in the Words of the Dalai Lama’, The Tibet Journal 33/2 (2008), pp. 65–90; and religion and secularism: Trine Brox, ‘Changing the Tibetan Way? Contesting Secularisms in the Tibetan Diaspora’, in S. Arslan and P. Schwieger (eds), Tibetan Studies: An Anthology (Anbieter, 2010), pp. 117–42. 4. Cf. Michael Lackner, Iwo Amelung, and Joachim Kurtz, New Terms for New Ideas: Western Knowledge and Lexical Change in Late Imperial China (Leiden, 2001). 5. E.g. Jane Ardley, ‘Learning the Art of Democracy? Continuity and Change in the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’, Contemporary South Asia 12/3 (2003); Carole McGranahan, ‘Truth, Fear, and Lies: Exile Politics and Arrested Histories of the Tibetan Resistance’, Cultural Anthropology 10/4 (2005); Helen R. Boyd, The Future of Tibet: The Government-in-Exile Meets the Challenge of Democratization (New York, 2004). 6. Guillermo O’Donnell et al., Transitions from Authoritarian Rule (Baltimore, 1986). 7. Ann Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization among Tibetans in Exile’, Journal of Asian Studies 66/1 (2007).

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8. Julia Paley, ‘Toward an Anthropology of Democracy’, Annual Review of Anthropology 31 (2002), p. 477. 9. David Beetham, ‘Liberal Democracy and the Limits of Democratization’, in D. Held (ed.), Prospects for Democracy: North, South, East, West (Cambridge 1993), p. 55; and Ghia Nodia, ‘The Democratic Path’, Journal of Democracy 13/3 (2002), p. 16. 10. Osvaldo M. Iazzetta, ‘Introduction’, in G. O’Donnell, J.V. Cullell, and O.M. Iazzetta (eds), The Quality of Democracy: Theory and Applications (Notre Dame, 2004), p. 2. 11. Guillermo O’Donnell and Philippe C. Schmitter (eds), Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies (Baltimore, 1986), p. 9. 12. Helena Catt, ‘Assessing the Practice of Democracy’, Democracy in Practice (London, 1999); David Beetham, ‘Key Principles and Indices for a Democratic Audit’, Defining and Measuring Democracy (London, 1994). Beetham explained that popular control consists of four dimensions: free and fair elections; an open and accountable government; guaranteed political and civil rights; and finally the arena of civil society. Catt has also given a good introduction to the tradition of democracy assessment, showing, for example, how the same countries score differently in democracy rankings. When it comes to assessing the quality of democracy, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) sets an example for a framework. The IDEA Handbook presents seven mediating values of democratic audit: participation, authorisation, representation, accountability, transparency, responsiveness and solidarity. Through these mediating values, the principles of popular control and political equality can be given effect. The IDEA Handbook also identifies the requirements for these mediating values and which institutional means have to be present in order to realise them. See David Beetham et al., International IDEA Handbook on Democracy Assessment (The Hague, 2002), p. 14. 13. Guillermo O’Donnell et al., Transitions: Tentative Conclusions, p. 8. 14. See Joseph A. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (London, 2005 [1943]). 15. Held, Models of Democracy, pp. 310–11. Robert A. Dahl, Democracy and Its Critics (New Haven, 1989), p. 222. 16. Cf. Robert A. Dahl, Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition (New Haven, 1971); Democracy and Its Critics. The argument that Dahl chose to speak about polyarchy instead of democracy because democracy never was realised has been advanced by, for example, Larry Diamond, ‘Thinking About Hybrid Regimes’, Journal of Democracy 13/2 (2002), p. 34; and Erik Oddvar Eriksen and John Erik Fossum, Europe in Transformation: How to Reconstitute Democracy? (2007). Available at http://aei.pitt.edu/7876/1/fossum-j-10d.pdf (accessed 22 August 2015), p. 8, n.14. 17. Stephanie Roemer, The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large (New York, 2008).

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18. Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization’; and Lobsang Sangay, ‘Democracy in Distress’, SJD dissertation, Harvard University, 2004. 19. Ardley, ‘Learning the Art’, pp. 123– 4. 20. Larry Diamond, ‘Introduction: In Search of Consolidation’, in L. Diamond et al. (eds), Consolidating the Third Wave Democracies: Themes and Perspectives (Baltimore, 1997), p. xvi. 21. See: Ardley, ‘Learning the Art’; Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization’; and Stephanie Roemer, The Tibetan Government-in-Exile: Politics at Large. 22. The Dalai Lama has been singled out by Ardley, ‘Learning the Art’; Lobsang Sangay, ‘Democracy in Distress’; and Roemer, Tibetan Government, as a major obstacle to democracy. 23. Frechette, ‘Democracy and Democratization’, p. 105. 24. Ibid., p. 140. 25. Joachim Kurtz, ‘Coming to Terms with Logic: The Naturalization of an Occidental Notion in China’, in M. Lackner, I. Amelung, and J. Kurtz (eds), New Terms for New Ideas: Western Knowledge and Lexical Change in Late Imperial China (Leiden, 2001). 26. Bassnett, Translation, p. 165. 27. Andre Lefevere, ‘Mother Courage’s Cucumbers: Text, System and Refraction in a Theory of Literature’, Modern Language Studies 12/4 (1982). 28. Editorial, ‘Pitfalls of Gifted Democracy’, Tibetan Review 35/7 (2000), p, 3. 29. Editorial, ‘Time to Unpack our Gift of Democracy’, Tibetan Review, September (2010), p. 3. 30. English-language interview with Norgye Tashi (pseudonym, male 46), Gangkyi, March 2007. 31. English-language interview with Pema Gyal (pseudonym, male 29), McLeod Ganj, April 2007. 32. Maurice Godelier, The Enigma of the Gift (Chicago, 1999 [1996]), p. 179. 33. English-language interview with Kesang Norbu (pseudonym, male 26), McLeod Ganj, December 2005. 34. English-language interview with Pema Thinley (male 44), Delhi, April 2007. 35. Tibetan-language interview with Tenzin Lhamo (pseudonym, female 39), McLeod Ganj, October 2012.

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INDEX

13 settlements, 5, 272, 274, 348n40 accountability, 27, 159, 180, 217, 289, 329n35, 354n12 administrator, settlement, 78, 126, 127– 36, 138, 216, 218, 228 – 35, 324n42– 3, 339n14 Alagappa, Muthiah, 143, 177, 326n2 Amnye Machen Institute, 152, 153, 276–7 anti-competitiveness, 218 – 19, 226 – 7, 240– 1 anti-Dalai Lama, 152, 274 –7 aristocracy, 1, 15, 16, 17, 26, 44, 73, 74, 79, 186, 237–8, 190 army, 6, 16, 61 110, 113, 190, 260, 274 Asad, Talal, 18, 21, 212 Asian values, 35, 37, 181 – 2, 310n135 –6, 326n4 authoritarianism, 29 –37, 181, 275, 307n107 authority, 59, 85, 126, 130, 131, 134, 167, 186, 188, 203, 217, 218, 228, 231– 5, 239, 241, 253, 316n27, 334n29 of the Dalai Lama, 1 – 2, 53, 55, 61– 3, 69– 70, 77, 87, 92, 97, 99 –101, 189, 202, 237, 271, 279, 291, 296, 350n43 autonomy (in Tibet), 6, 10, 77, 91, 150, 154, 157, 246, 271, 278, 317n39 genuine, 77, 95, 105, 278, 286, 317n39

Benjamin, Walter, 44 Bhutan, 3, 104, 110–11 Bon religion, 41, 45, 68, 80, 116, 220, 230, 336n45, 339n11 Buddhism, 41, 98, 107, 116, 145, 198, 227, 329n33 compatibility with democracy, 37, 46, 58, 65, 67, 70, 73, 181– 2, 200 –2, 337n54 national identity and, see identity, Buddhism and in political structure, 45, 68, 80, 84, 91, 186 –90, 223– 4, 318n50 politics and, 15, 185, 198–200, 209, 211 – 12, 253 secularity and, 182– 3, 190– 5, 213 see also chos business, 23, 107, 113, 114, 115, 133, 145, 169, 221, 235, 242 Buxa, 111 Bylakuppe, 55, 95, 104– 40, 165 –9, 217, 222, 229 –30, 234, 272 see also Dickey Larsoe Settlement; Lugsung Samdupling Settlement cabinet, 7, 76, 80– 1, 90, 92–3, 164, 176, 235, 242, 247, 255, 256, 269, 280, 317n39 camps, 1, 107, 111–12, 126– 7, 129, 131 –7, 166 – 9, 227, 228–9, 234 –6, 272, 324n42

378

TIBETAN DEMOCRACY

censorship, 27, 176, 232, 270, 274 –9 census, 7 Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), 2, 24, 26, 56, 57, 58, 62– 3, 64, 65, 68, 76, 79, 82, 113, 121, 128 – 9, 130, 135– 6, 142, 145, 150 history of, 6– 13, 59, 77 name of, 7 –9 organisation, 3– 5, 6 –13, 44, 45, 104 as proxy state, 7, 142 –3, 177, 179 relation to organisations, 153 – 80 Chandigarh, 151, 157, 170, 207, 222 change, political, 2, 16, 17, 29 –31, 48, 54, 64, 66, 87, 96, 100 –1, 136, 143, 148, 154, 157, 158, 164, 165, 172, 175, 178, 202, 205 – 6, 207, 211, 213, 221, 232, 242, 245 – 52, 255– 6 Charter of Tibetans-in-Exile, 12, 45, 46, 56, 66, 76, 80– 3, 87, 90, 101, 126, 128, 130, 191–8, 206, 223, 224, 230, 277, 295, 335n31, 337n52, 342n60 amendments, 92, 99, 102, 243 – 4, 253, 344n90 discussion of draft, 78, 191 – 8 children, 4, 24, 72, 106, 111, 115 – 19, 121, 123, 146, 267, 271 China, 5, 8 – 11, 16, 28, 31, 66, 76, 79, 81– 2, 89, 91, 93, 97, 147, 176, 183, 190, 247, 249, 319n68, 248n39 chol kha gsum (three regions of Tibet), 10, 80, 267 chos, 15 –16, 17, 256, 297 –9 in the charter, 70, 191 – 8 culture and, 54, 94, 336 – 7n50 democracy and, 73, 84– 5, 181 – 214 srid and, 53, 61, 71 –2, 74, 100, 316n26, 334n29, 335n37 translation of, 15, 41, 303n49, 332n7 see also Buddhism; religion chos lugs ris med (impartiality with regard to religious traditions), 191 – 8 see also secularism chos srid zung ‘brel (merged spiritual law and politics), 71, 83, 84, 186 –90,

193 –5, 198, 211, 214, 316n26, 334n29, 335– 6n38 Christianity, 15, 19, 41, 336n45 Christians, 266, 268, 336n45 Chusi Gangdruk, 150, 348–9n41 citizen, 4, 9, 12, 25– 7, 29, 30, 63, 82, 180, 194, 206– 7, 211, 217, 226, 236, 240, 290, 299n1, 306n96, 310n146, 342n60 model, 4, 58, 105, 114, 117, 218 citizenship, 4– 6, 20, 24, 27, 30, 140, 179, 227, 272, 274, 289, 302n38, 348n40 civil society, 19, 28, 37, 39, 59, 64, 141 –4, 148, 156, 174, 179–80, 225, 326–7n4, 327n5, 354n12 definition of, 143 entrenchment model, 141, 180 neo-Tocquevillean, 141– 2, 180, 326n2 state –civil society separation, 27, 142, 175 – 9 transmission belt model, 141 clergy, see monasteries; monk(s) communalism, 36, 173, 192, 208, 266, 269, 272, 336n44 communism, 31, 35, 61, 75, 76, 79, 93, 160, 193, 312n178, 329n37 community hall, 107, 114, 117, 132, 134, 257 conflict, 36, 44, 58, 137, 189, 234, 254 –84, 325n56 conflicting values, 17 –18, 19, 21, 24, 36 see also tension constitution, 27, 52, 162 Constitution of Tibet, 45, 52, 64, 66, 68– 70, 71, 73, 74, 75, 79– 80, 83, 90, 206 guidelines for future Tibet, 81– 3 contestation, 38, 42, 177, 257, 269– 70, 279 see also opposition cooperative society (co-op), 126–7, 129, 133, 134, 135, 227 CTA, see Central Tibetan Administration cultural genocide, 183

INDEX culture, 6, 14– 18, 22 –3, 53– 4, 76, 79, 91, 104–5, 115– 21, 183, 195, 202, 213– 14, 284, 314n205, 336– 7n50 Asian culture, 37, 181 – 2, 310n145 political, 45, 158, 170, 180, 210, 219, 226, 240, 245, 266, 290, 291 politics of, 304n51 translation and, 3, 25, 34– 5, 38– 44, 47, 185, 193, 214, 256, 286 – 8 Dahl, Robert A., 289–90, 292, 354n16 Dalai Lama, the Fourteenth, 10 architect of democracy, 1– 3, 46, 62 authority and powers, 1, 26, 53 –7, 60– 3, 69 –70, 81, 82, 92, 99, 101, 200, 202, 204, 291 blind faith in, 60, 172 – 3, 209 CTA and, 5 –7, 12, 59, 63, 68– 9, 142, 144, 145, 193, 239 devolution of power, 8– 9, 63, 99– 103, 203, 233, 251– 3, 297, 344n90 discourse, 62– 103, 201, 191 – 3, 212, 266, 287, 315n7, 316n29 in exile, 3, 16 –17, 22– 4, 97, 110, 115, 129 gift from, 1– 3, 47– 57, 70, 88– 89, 162, 165, 201, 212, 232, 241, 251, 262, 270, 271, 286– 8, 292 – 7 as impediment to democracy, 8, 86– 9, 100, 210, 270, 275– 8 institution, 95, 100–2, 186 – 7, 189–90, 238, 333n21 internationalisation, 66– 7 leadership, 69, 101– 2, 175, 198, 205, 209–10, 213, 239, 241, 252, 268–9, 281, 283– 4, 297 – 8, 337n54, 345n96 legitimisation via, 180, 218, 228, 231–4, 236– 7, 240, 249 – 50, 252–3 mortality, 95, 97 –9, 241 – 2, 297 organisations and, 154, 159, 160, 163, 167, 175 semi-retirement, 65, 66, 89 –95, 241–2, 297 translation of democracy, 43– 4, 63– 103, 182, 202, 286

379

Dalai Lama, the Fifth, 8, 10, 85, 100– 1, 110, 186, 240 Dalai Lama, the Thirteenth, 16, 190 da¯na, see gift, da¯na Dekyiling, 95, 128, 131 democracy adjectival, 32– 6, 289, 291 anthropology of, 38, 289 assessment of, 8, 29, 281, 288– 96, 307n107, 354n12 bicameral, 82, 158– 9, 269, 309n136; 329n35 Buddhism and, see Buddhism, compatibility with democracy civil society and, 141– 80 consolidation of, 30– 1, 35, 96– 7, 141, 144 definition of/models of, 26– 8, 29, 74– 5 discursive and translational change, 64– 5, 66– 7, 286–8, 291, 297–8 exile and, 15, 44– 6, 89 freedom and, 26– 8, 57, 67, 72, 75, 83, 89, 91, 217, 227, 239, 312n178 freedom struggle and, 2, 3 –6, 72, 89, 94, 97, 179, 191, 216, 254– 84 as gift, see Dalai Lama, gift from; gift, of democracy input aspects of, 29– 30, 33, 52, 159, 164, 174, 175, 217, 228, 242, 286, 289, 290 local, 105, 106, 130–1, 133, 137, 139 modernity and, 2, 18– 20, 22, 39, 84, 183 – 6, 207, 251, 255– 6, 290 output aspects of, 29 –30, 150, 151, 175, 217 – 18, 233 recognition and, 8, 10– 12, 46, 90, 161, 216, 254–5 three pillars of, 67, 95– 6, 131 top-down, 2, 57, 136, 180, 210 universality of, 18, 19, 24– 5, 28– 30, 32, 34– 8, 42– 3, 46, 254, 286, 289, 292 democracy assistance, 28, 31 –2, 46, 170, 178 –80, 216–17, 244, 306n98 Democracy Day, 13, 64, 83, 97, 219 democracy in Asia, 25, 31, 35– 7 Democracy Index, 29, 35, 307n107

380

TIBETAN DEMOCRACY

democracy promotion, see democracy assistance democratic deficits, 292 – 6 democratisation, 29– 32, 36, 70, 286, 290 demonstration, see rallies demos, 1, 25– 6, 45, 79 –80, 237, 281, 299– 300n1, 302n39 Desi Goleb Syndrome, 240 Dharamsala, 5 – 6, 14, 95, 105 –6, 111, 127– 8, 130, 135 –8, 143 – 8, 150, 175, 180, 215, 218, 222, 228 – 34, 239, 295, 303n44, 304n51 diaspora, 11– 2, 16, 26, 142, 160, 258, 261, 293 Dickey Larsoe Settlement, 105, 107, 112 – 4, 126, 131 – 2, 222, 322n9 village leader, see leadership, of camp and village see also Bylakuppe dmangs gtso (democracy), 16, 64, 70, 74– 5, 79, 286 newspaper of the Amnye Machen Institute, 152, 276 – 7 economy, 19, 28, 31, 45, 55, 68, 73, 81, 113, 115, 117, 120, 146, 150, 164, 167, 177– 9, 242, 247, 306n98, 331n63 education, 4, 7, 15, 16– 17, 23 –4, 45, 68, 72– 3, 77, 81, 107, 111, 115 –19, 123, 146, 151, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 163, 166, 173, 180, 186, 190, 203– 4, 209, 211, 222, 225, 239, 240, 242, 288, 298, 323n24, 328n33 Basic Education Policy, 116 election, 2, 7, 9, 11, 13, 27, 28, 33, 66, 70, 80, 83, 86, 95, 130, 168, 175, 215– 53, 254, 259, 263, 277, 286, 288, 289 of administrator, 128, 228, 233 –5 of camp leader, 133, 228, 235 – 6 campaigning, 161 –2, 169 – 74, 226, 240–51, 253, 288, 295, 342n63, 343n74 of MPs, 1, 144, 150, 219 –27

of prime minister, 90, 92–4, 96, 100, 144, 152, 158, 219, 240–53, 345n99 procedures, 90 –3, 224 rituals, 165, 216– 17, 233, 236 rules, 92, 161, 220, 223 Election Commission, 129, 221, 222, 224, 225, 250, 339n14 emigrants, 117– 9 enlightened government, 70, 202, 238 equality, 18, 69, 73– 4, 80, 201, 238, 289 exclusion, 5, 57, 192, 273– 4, 336n44 exile, political, 11– 15, 140, 148, 254–5, 258 –9, 264, 274, 281 family, 112 – 14, 117– 18, 123, 133–5, 146, 204–5, 225 farming, 105, 108, 111– 14, 125, 129, 134 –6 Five Point Peace Plan, 77 Frechette, Ann, 58, 70, 142, 238, 274, 287, 290, 291, 332n83 free speech, 270– 2, 275 see also censorship freedom struggle, see democracy, freedom struggle and Ganden Phodrang (dga’ ldan pho brang), 8– 10, 65, 85, 98, 100, 101, 186–7, 189 –90, 213, 233, 237, 293, 342n60 Gandhi, Mahatma, 58, 192, 193, 197, 278 gift da¯na, 47 of democracy, see Dalai Lama, the Fourteenth, gift from disenchantment, 52, 103, 178, 194, 207 – 13, 253, 288, 296– 7 enchanted gift, 47, 49– 58, 241, 294, 296 exchange, 49, 51, 55– 6, 313n182 as a form of governance, 54– 5 free, 49 –50, 179, 332n83 from the Dalai Lama, see Dalai Lama, the Fourteenth, gift from inalienable, 49– 50, 55 recipient, 49– 57, 101, 106, 285, 288, 293 – 6

INDEX sacred, 51– 2, 57, 288, 294, 296 theoretical discussion of, 47– 57 governance, 2, 6, 16, 25, 30– 1, 34, 44, 54– 5, 62, 71 –3, 101, 143, 180, 185, 189– 90, 193, 208 government-in-exile, see also Central Tibetan Administration definition of, 11– 12, Tibetan, 1, 2, 7 –10, 58, 65, 81, 232, 239, 242, 255, 280– 1 green book, 13, 174, 221, 222, 223, 224, 302n38 Grundbegriffe, 39, 285 GuChuSum, 149, 150, 244 guerrilla, 6, 68, 150, 274, 302n32, 248n41 home-district associations (skyid sdug), 149– 51, 162, 267 see also mutual-aid societies human rights, 10, 18, 31, 39, 67, 68, 69, 76, 82, 84, 91, 146, 152, 153, 230, 285, 310n146, 312n178 identity, 4, 5, 12, 34, 45, 105, 117, 119– 20, 139, 144, 172, 221, 227, 261, 267, 269, 272, 283, 352n79 Buddhism and, 15– 6, 182, 184, 195, 212, 268, 283, 304n50, 336n45 imagined community, 13, 261 impartiality with regard to religious traditions, see chos lugs ris med independence, 6, 10, 16, 22, 68, 77, 125, 150, 154, 155, 157, 162, 175, 178, 210, 226, 246, 259, 260, 271, 278, 286, 312n178 India, 3 – 5, 26, 35– 6 Government of India, 3, 5, 81, 108, 111–12, 113, 125, 153 inside– outside dilemma, 258, 280 – 4 Islam, 15, 37, 41, 181, 336n45 Jamyang Norbu, 8 –9, 207, 220, 241, 246, 247, 248, 270, 273, 274 – 8, 345n99, 351n57, 351n60 Jonang, 41, 311n160, 312n76 Justice Commission, 45, 81, 95, 107

381

kalon tripa (bka’ blon khris pa), see prime minister Karma Choephel, 160– 1, 162, 195–6, 198, 210 –1, 244, 330 Karma Yeshi, 151, 161–2, 173, 221– 2, 264 –6 king of universal respect (mang pos bkur ba’i rgyal po), 91– 2 Koselleck, Reinhardt, 18, 39, 284 leadership of camp and village (brgya dpon or spyi mi), 126 – 7, 131–5, 136– 7, 167, 216 – 7, 227– 9, 234 –6 of the CTA, see Central Tibetan Administration of the Dalai Lama, see Dalai Lama, the Fourteenth, leadership of group and neighbourhood (bcu dpon or gzhis grong spyi mi), 126– 7, 132 – 3, 324n42 srid skyong, 252 –3, 297– 8, 345n96 legitimacy, 12, 46, 77 democratic, 62, 218, 228, 241, 253 of CTA, 8 – 9, 231–3, 348n40 input and output, 29, 52, 150–1, 159, 164, 174–5, 217, 289 –90, 296 – 7 Lhasang Tsering, 207, 276, 351n57 liminality, 5, 106, 138–40, 246 Lobsang Sangay, 156, 194, 196, 206, 244, 246 –53, 255–6, 271, 275, 280–1, 284, 317n29, 337n54, 342n63, 345n96, 352n79 local assembly, 126–7, 129– 31, 139, 229 –30 loyalty, 8, 12, 13, 44, 55, 56, 158, 192, 233, 254 –5, 257, 259, 261, 266, 269, 273 –6, 279– 80, 303n40, 325n56, 334n27, 348n39, 349n42 Lugsam, see Lugsung Samdupling Settlement Lugsung Samdupling Settlement, 107, 111 –14, 126, 132– 3, 222, 322n9 camp leader, see leadership, of camp and village see also Bylakuppe; camps

382

TIBETAN DEMOCRACY

Mang gtso (democracy), see dmangs gtso Mao Zedong, 61, 76, 198, 200 Mauss, Marcel, 50 McConnell, Fiona, 7, 104, 105 McLeod Ganj, 145– 7, 151 members of parliament, see parliament merged spiritual law and politics, see chos srid zung ‘brel Middle-Way approach, 77, 89, 136, 153, 163, 173, 205, 241, 278 Missamari, 111 modern moment, 16– 8, 22– 3, 186, 213, 290 modernisation, 6, 18– 21, 137, 182, 183, 184, 211, 214, 296 modernity, 2, 17– 24, 39, 72, 84, 183 – 6, 197, 207, 213–14, 251, 255 – 6, 285, 288, 290, 304n51 modernity –tradition binary, 17, 21, 22, 71, 73, 158, 210, 211 –12, 214, 251, 255– 6, 304n51, 328 – 9n33 monasteries, 107– 10, 122 – 4, 182 –3, 194, 199, 211, 220, 229, 333n24 as democratic institutions, 202 election and, 171, 203 – 7, 225, 252, 330n42 freedom fight, 122, 146 recruitment, 122– 3, 146, 186 wealth, 122 Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Commission (MTAC), 11, 272, 273 – 4, 348n39, 348n41 monk(s), see monasteries monk officials, 44– 5, 65, 186 –7, 206, 237, 319n61, 334n27 reserved seats in parliament, see religion– region template of the parliament Muslims, 266, 268– 9 mutual-aid societies (skyid sdug), 149 –50, 175, 216, 341n39, 348n41 see also home-district associations National Endowment for Democracy (NED), 152, 244, 306n98, 331n63 nationalism, 13, 17, 36, 182, 274, 304n50, 309n142 long-distance, 255, 259 – 61, 274

NDPT, see party, political, National Democratic Party of Tibet Nehru, Jawaharlal, 20, 61, 115 neighbourhood (gzhis grong or bcu gshog), 107, 121, 126–7, 132–4, 136, 164, 166 –8 representative, see leadership, of group and neighbourhood Nepal, 3, 35, 58, 104, 123, 145, 274, 302n32, 344n85 new arrival (gsar ‘byor), 24, 64, 145– 6, 147, 150 Nobel Peace Prize, 13, 64, 77 non-sectarianism, 21, 96, 196, 213, 337n54 occidental longing, 119 opposition, 33, 36, 70, 154– 5, 170, 176, 248, 266, 269– 70, 279, 283, 290 Panchen Lama, 13, 183 parachute kids, 118 parliament, 1–2, 7, 45–6, 64, 68, 70, 76, 78, 80–2, 92, 102, 127, 146, 152–3, 162, 164, 160, 171–5, 191–4, 198, 206, 227, 243, 245, 248, 253–6, 263, 269, 275, 278, 315n7 biographies of MPs, 173, 224– 5, 245, 248 election of, see election, of MPs religion –region matrix, see religion – region template of the parliament party, political, 27, 28, 86, 160– 3, 201, 225, 277, 293, 309n316, 326n2, 326n4 Chinese Communist Party, 31, 76 multi-party system, 80, 82, 152, 158, 159, 261, 269, 276 National Democratic Party of Tibet, 160 – 3, 171, 175, 195, 201, 225, 244, 269– 70 no-partyism, 33, 160, 270 Tibetan Communist Party, 160, 329n37 passport, 7, 274 patriots, patriotism, 4, 13, 20, 108, 115, 119 –22, 151, 165– 6, 180, 215, 226, 239, 263, 272, 276

INDEX peace, 67, 77, 82, 84, 91, 201, 283, 284 Pema Thinley, 4 –5, 51, 136, 156, 226, 231– 2, 292, 295–6 Phuljung, 283, 352– 3n79 polyvocality, 266, 269–73, 279 PRC, see China prime minister (kalon tripa, bka’ blon khris pa), 82, 86, 99, 102, 115, 144, 152, 170, 196, 203– 7, 218, 243 – 5, 248, 250, 255– 6, 283, 296, 337n54, 342n60, 345n99 campaigns, see election, campaigning election, see election, of prime minister name change to srid skyong, 253, 345n99 protected area, 108, 109 rallies, 13, 121– 2, 146–8, 150, 157 – 8, 163, 167– 8, 225, 263 recognition, diplomatic, 8, 10, 12, 46, 90, 216, 254 see also democracy, recognition and regionalism, 173, 208, 227, 251, 266 – 7, 281, 336n44 registration card, 4, 13 reincarnation, 46, 54, 60, 95, 97– 8, 209, 349n43 religion, 2, 4, 19 –21, 41, 45, 54, 80, 98, 122, 147, 152, 184, 192, 194, 204, 267– 8, 283, 286, 336n45 politics and, 16, 48, 53, 61, 154, 181–214, 279, 290, 316n26, 316n27 see also Buddhism; chos religion– region template of the parliament, 33, 45, 68, 80, 159, 161, 171, 189, 194, 207, 223, 225, 227, 261, 318n50, 330n42 remittances, 117, 120 representativity, 159, 233, 329n35 return, 6, 11, 14, 24, 25, 47, 68, 69, 71, 82, 105–6, 110, 111, 114, 125, 126, 137– 40, 146, 226, 254 – 5, 258– 65, 272, 281, 283 –4 Richter, Melvin, 39 road construction work, 111, 112, 324n42 Roemer, Stephanie, 58, 181 – 2, 281, 302n32

383

Samdhong Rinpoche, 9, 16, 78, 79, 93, 116, 117, 118, 131, 156, 164, 170, 176, 179, 187, 190, 193, 194, 196, 200, 203 –6, 242– 3, 250, 252– 3, 334 –5n31 sarva dharma sambhava, 192 Schaffer, Frederic C., 42 schools, see education Schumpeter, Joseph A., 289–1 sectarianism, 208, 227– 8, 266, 269, 281, 336n44 see also non-sectarianism secular, secularism, secularisation, 16, 18–21, 32, 34, 39, 52, 73, 78, 98, 124, 152, 182– 5, 191–8, 207– 14, 253, 266, 269, 272, 276–7, 286, 288, 297, 337n52, 337n54 self-determination, see autonomy self-immolation, 7, 53, 147, 282– 3, 319n68, 352n73 Sera Monastery, 107, 109, 122, 190, 199, 334n27 settlements, 3 – 4, 23, 104–40, 143, 151, 157, 165 –9, 207, 218, 221–2, 228 –36, 239 see also Bylakuppe; Dickey Larsoe Settlement; Lugsung Samdupling Settlement Shain, Yossi, 10, 11, 12, 216, 254– 5, 264, 273, 274, 279, 281 Shangri-La, 14, 24, 303n44 Shugden, 6, 272, 336n44, 349n42 skyid sdug, see home-district associations splittism, 90, 319n68 srid skyong, see leadership, srid skyong state, proxy, 142 –3, 177, 179 State Council of the PRC, 98, 157 state-in-the-making, 142 students, 115 – 17, 139, 149, 153, 155, 222, 328n33 see also education Students for a Free Tibet, 115, 244 support, 5, 149, 302n32 financial, 11, 120, 137, 164, 179 international, 11, 12, 46, 68, 69, 77, 90, 150, 157, 194, 241, 254, 273, 280, 303n40 popular, 11, 92, 155, 254, 273, 280, 281

384

TIBETAN DEMOCRACY

tax, voluntary, 7, 11, 12 –13, 121, 150, 221, 222– 3, 239, 273, 348n40 Taylor, Charles, 19, 20, 211, 212, 272 tension, 59 chos – politics, 16, 181 – 214 freedom struggle – democracy, 254–84 traditional authority – democratic legitimacy, 215 – 53 Tenzin Namgyal Tethong, 244, 246 – 52, 342n63, 343n74 theocracy, 93, 316n27, 334n29 Tibet in the future, 6, 24, 65– 7, 69, 70, 72, 76– 83, 86, 88, 89, 92, 96, 105, 117, 164, 191, 262, 286, 291 in the past, 8, 13, 14– 18, 22– 5, 39, 65, 71– 2, 73, 85, 89, 91, 105, 184, 186–90, 202, 212, 252 – 3, 286, 312n178 Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), 9, 82, 317n39 Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, 152, 153, 229 Tibetan Children’s Village, 2, 107, 146 Tibetan Freedom Movement, 12, 129, 150, 221, 229, 339n14 Tibetan government-in-exile, 1, 2, 7 – 8, 58, 65, 232, 239, 242, 280 – 1, 306n98 see also government-in-exile, Tibetan; Central Tibetan Administration Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre, 152 – 4 Tibetan Women’s Association, 121 –2, 127, 143, 150, 151, 154, 163 – 9, 170, 175, 180, 216, 229, 244, 278 Tibetan Youth Congress, 8, 13, 121 –2, 143– 4, 147, 150 –1, 154 – 63, 175– 6, 178, 180, 196 – 7, 229, 247, 270, 278 tradition –modernity binary, see modernity – tradition binary

translation, 3, 25, 30, 34– 5, 38– 45, 47, 106, 143, 285– 7, 291–2 afterlife, 44 bsgyur ba, 43, 287 cultural, 40, 158n311 by the Dalai Lama, see Dalai Lama, the Fourteenth, translation of democracy definition of, 39 as metamorphosis, 39– 40, 42– 3, 44, 287, 291 multi-layered, 43, 58, 287, 311n167 runaway effect, 63, 103 United Nations, 10, 11, 68, 77, 306n98 United States, 19, 77, 118– 20, 125, 140, 220, 221, 277 United States Agency for International Development (USAID), 178, 306n98 unity, national, 13, 44, 105, 154, 192, 232, 233, 257– 84 vote, see election voter turnout, 159, 164, 175, 216, 219 –22, 251, 339n11 Weber, Max, 19, 193, 196, 197, 207, 208, 210, 212, 213, 253 Welfare Officer, see administrator, settlement Woeser, 274 –5 youth, 121, 146, 152, 155– 6, 171, 208, 210, 222–3, 239, 244, 246, 248, 249, 263, 331n68 Youth for Better Democracy (YFBD), 143 –4, 154, 162, 169–74, 175, 180, 225, 244, 331n62– 3 Youth for Better MPs (YBMPs), see Youth for Better Democracy zone of peace, 77, 82