China is a Law Unto Itself

In the 1990s, there was a belief in the west that economic progress would inevitably bring multi-party democracy to China. More recently, there has been a similar belief that the coming of the Beijing Olympic games would spur the People's Republic to improve its human rights record.

Today's report by Amnesty International shows that the second belief was as unfounded as the first. Whether the Chinese authorities actually gave an undertaking to improve their performance on the human rights front remains unclear. At the time when the 2008 games were awarded to the PRC in 2001, the International Olympic Committee director general spoke of human rights as "a very serious issue" and added: "We are taking the bet that seven years from now we sincerely and dearly hope we shall see many changes." Those remarks were not reported at the time on the mainland, though China Daily said it thought the games would "leave a legacy to the country's environment and human rights".

As the authorities imposed a pre-Olympic clampdown on everything from Beijing bars to the street behavior of the inhabitants of the capital, the last few months have seen, if anything, a toughening up of action against dissidents, ethnic minorities and those who are seen as threatening the established order. The micro-managing of the context in which the competition will take place next month is in keeping with the nature of a regime which, from its earliest days, has made control a priority.

On an everyday, individual basis, life in China has become much freer in the last decade. But the Communist party and the civilian authorities remain intensely suspicious of anything they regard as constituting a real or potential challenge to their authority. Not only do they want to maintain complete control, they also want to nip in the bud anything and anybody who steps outside the political straitjacket.

In a sense, this is a heritage from the Communist party's past. Its long history of clandestine struggle after the "White Terror" unleashed by Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang Nationalists against it in 1927 bred both paranoia and a readiness to use violence as a political weapon. The idea that a single spark could start a forest fire that would burn down the existing governmental structure means that any dissent, however small, can be seen as containing the seeds of eventual regime change.

The rule of law remains weak, and subject to official "guidance". Dissidence is easily equated with treason. On a grassroots level, the extent to which local officials are involved in crony deals with business or simply skim off what they can through graft make those who stand up to them subject to harassment and persecution.

As the country's economic strength has grown, another factor has come into play. With its 10% growth and $1.8tn in foreign reserves, Beijing feels less and less inclined to bow to external pressure, be it over the value of its currency or on human rights. If the rest of the world expected the PRC to become more cuddly as a result of the Olympics, recent events have shown how mistaken that expectation was.

China has vetoed UN sanctions on Zimbabwe, continues to back the regimes in Sudan and Burma, and is taking a tougher line on a variety of economic issues.

Its leadership and its people see the three decades since Deng Xiaoping launched market-led economic reforms as a time of huge success marking what the official news agency Xinhua has hailed as a "renaissance" of the world's most populous nation. A recent survey of national attitudes showed 90% of Chinese satisfied with their nation. Officials continue to argue that the most important human right is the right not to die of hunger, and point to the great improvement in Chinese living standards as proof of progress while foreign governments prefer "constructive engagement" and "quiet diplomacy" to making a fuss about human rights abuses.

In those circumstances, the Amnesty report is, unfortunately, unsurprising. Beijing may issue a pro forma response. But little else is likely to follow. China is a law to itself. The world should make its criticism heard, as Amnesty has done; but it cannot expect there to be much result.