NIAS Studies in Asian Topics, 53. Copenhagen: NIAS Press; Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press [distributor], 2014. xvi, 320 pp. (Figures, tables.) US$32.00, paper. ISBN 978-87-7694-142-0.
On the Fringes of the Harmonious Society is a collection of papers from a workshop held at the University of Copenhagen. The editors have drawn together academics working on Tibet and Xinjiang, situating their works in the context of China’s development strategy. The term “harmonious society” is drawn from Hu Jintao’s motto during his presidency. Hu was intimately connected to Tibet as the CCP’s first secretary. During his presidency of China, he launched the “Western Development Program,” which sought to promote an aggressive development strategy for the poor regions on the periphery within the mainstream of China’s economy. In the introduction, the editors hope to “make better sense, of the complex interconnectedness between culture, ethnic, and development policies in China” (1). The introduction also quotes Steven Harrell’s description of the regions as the “most resistant to the Centre’s civilizing efforts”(3). Despite similarities, the two regions are treated as distinct with differing milieus, Buddhist Tibet and Islamic Xinjiang.
The collection consists of twelve contributions, with six papers dealing with Tibet and five papers devoted to Uyghurs. Only the paper by Andrew Fischer (29–68) provides systemic comparative studies of the two regions. Fischer’s chapter looks at the “structural foundations” of governance and economic strategies. He places the two regions within the context of state-led economic and developmental models, showing economic growth rates in Tibet and Xinjiang exceeded the national average between 2000 and 2010 (35). The rapid growth was seen as a success from the government’s point of view, but, as Fischer shows, it was not without its problems. Both Tibet and Xinjiang saw the growth generated by the expansion of state administration and infrastructure construction. Fischer focuses primarily on the labour transition resulting from the state’s development strategies. Both regions saw the privileging of the urban sector over the rural economy; economic development also led to the exclusion and marginalization of Tibetans and Uyghurs from major sources of employment. Fischer makes extensive use of official statistics compiled by provincial governments and the central government. These provide fruitful data for comparative studies of the regions; the data demonstrates growing marginalization of “minorities” in the labour market (65–66).
The rest of the contributions focus on region-specific issues; however, there are thematic similarities both in subject matter and issues highlighted in the papers. The contributions from Henryk Szadziewski (69–97), Tashi Nyima (127–158), and Elisa Cencetti (159–182) all deal with the effects of the “Open the West Campaign” (xibu da kaifa) in differing ways. All these chapters present similar findings in the development campaign that is aimed at closing the economic disparity between Western regions, which make up 71 percent of China’s landmass, yet account for less than 28 percent of GDP (72). As noted in Fischer’s contribution, the emphasis was on promoted material development without taking into account ethnic disparities in employment and income. An interesting comparative point made in the book is that economic transformation was more disruptive in Tibetan areas, as the changes involved the destruction of a pastoral economy.
Chris Hann’s (183–208) and Francoise Robin’s (209–234) contributions look at language issues in Tibet and Xinjiang. Language issues facing the Tibetans and Uyghurs are similar to the extent that the promotion of Chinese as the national language through state administration and education has disadvantaged indigenous languages. Both languages are seen as markers of identity and religion, and any decline in the use of them is associated with the stripping away of identity. The chapter by Emily Yeh (235–262) deals with of the environmental movement in China and points out that the Tibetan areas were the “point of origin” of China’s environmental activism (237). This would have presented a possibility of convergence of interested parties, beyond ethnicity and locality. Yeh shows that the Green Movement brought Tibet from the periphery to the mainstream of the Chinese nation. However, this presented a problem since it meant mobilizing the local Tibetans, and the Han environmentalists were far more sympathetic to local practices and mobilizing religious leaders to their sides. This led Tibetan environmentalists to create “a space for cultural assertion” (258), viewed by the authorities as detrimental to the state-led campaign of ethnic harmony due to its accentuating ethnic identity.
The papers by Joanne Finley (263–292), Rachel Harris (293–217), and Eric Schluessel (318–346) deal with social and cultural contestation in Xinjiang. Finley’s paper focuses on the reception of a popular television soap opera (Xinjiang Girl) and the debates it generated regarding inter-ethnic marriage. However, as the chapter shows, inter-ethnic marriage remains taboo and marriage is seen as a site of maintaining Uyghur identity and resisting assimilation. Rachel Harris’s chapter is the only one dealing with religion and gender issues, a subject that has received little to no attention in the context of Tibet or Xinjiang. The women’s ritual practices are seen as outside Uyghur Islamic society and the state views these practices as “discordant” with the state modernization goal, resulting in the double marginalization of Uyghur women. Eric Schluessel examines the positions of and articulations by Uyghur public intellectuals. The situation described by Schluessel is very similar to the position of Tibetan intellectuals. Uyghur and Tibetan intellectuals face the problem of critiquing internal social problems without seeming to endorse the colonial power’s accusations of backwardness.
The book makes valuable contributions to the study of Tibetans and Ugyhurs in contemporary China. By providing well-researched and ethnographically rich details of Tibet and Xinjiang, the book moves the subject beyond treating the people merely as “minorities” who are recipients of state benevolence.
Tsering Shakya
The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada