Capital punishment in China: A populist instrument of social governance

2013 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle Miao
Keyword(s):  
Capital Punishment ◽  
Political Legitimacy ◽  
Reform Era ◽  
Social Fragmentation ◽  
Social Governance ◽  
The People ◽  
Political Struggles ◽  
The Masses ◽  
Maoist China ◽  
Party State

Contrary to the assumption that authoritarian authorities are insensitive to popular demands for justice, the Chinese penal regime has been highly attentive and responsive to public sentiments since its early days. As an instrument for the authorities to govern the country in the name of the people, capital punishment functioned as a tool for political struggles in Maoist China and later served as a tool to fight crimes in Deng’s reform era. Nowadays, the demands of the masses for revenge, justice and equality have been translated into a fervent passion for capital punishment for certain offences and offenders. By reaching out to satisfy these public demands and sentiments, the party-state hopes to enhance its political legitimacy. In this sense, the death penalty serves as a populist mechanism to strengthen the resilience of the authoritarian party-state by venting public anxiety and resentment towards social problems created in the processes of China’s rapid modernization and social fragmentation.

Confucianism on Political Legitimacy

2019 ◽  
pp. 32-51
Author(s):  
Tongdong Bai
Keyword(s):  
Human Life ◽  
Political Legitimacy ◽  
The State ◽  
Basic Fact ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Basic Goods ◽  
The People ◽  
Xun Zi ◽  
The Masses ◽  
Political Decisions

This chapter discusses political legitimacy within the Confucian context. It attempts reconcile the early Confucians’ embrace of equality with their defense of hierarchy. The chapter also considers how to reconcile their idea that the legitimacy of the state lies in service to the people, with the idea that it is not the people alone who make the final political decisions. It shows that the lack of capacities of making sound political decisions by the masses cannot result from the failure of the state to secure basic goods, education, and other necessary conditions for people to make sound political decisions, and it has to be the result of a basic fact of human life. That is, in spite of all these governmental efforts that are demanded by them, and in spite of their beliefs that human beings are all potentially equal (Mencius and Xun Zi) or close to being equal (Confucius), early Confucians also took it as a fact of life that the majority of the people cannot actually obtain the capacity necessary to make sound political decisions and participate fully in politics.

scholarly journals Dilema Demokrasi Elektoral

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-94
Author(s):  
I Nyoman Wiratmaja
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Party ◽  
Political Legitimacy ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Reform Era ◽  
The People ◽  
Electoral Democracy ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
Shared Commitment

The practice of democracy is not the same as as its theory. People's sovereignty is often derailed by power-hungry political elites. Even though people in the Reform era are no longer expected to only play a limited role or merely as a giver or renew political legitimacy or as mere objects of political activity. It is worried because the practice of electoral democracy is felt further away from the spirit of democratic principles. There is still widespread behavior that justifies any means that is contrary to the values and principles of democracy, such as: politicization of SARA (suku, agama, ras, antargolongan) or politics of identity, criminalization of political opponents, dissemination of hoaxes, hate speeches, and intimidation, unneutral state apparatus, or election organizers, practices of money politics, sound auction and bribery, document forgery and manipulation of operating procedures. As a result, elected leaders often do not serve the people. All policies taken are often biased in the interests of the ruling elite or the interests of investors, and tend to be very minimal even without involving the people. In the future bad practices should not be continued and should be replaced by a shared commitment to establish substantial democracy by upholding law and justice. Stop the electoral democracy is only a lip-service of a five-year democratic party and must have a real contribution to the improvement of the nation. Electoral democracy must be an arena of healthy competition to get someone who is qualified and able to be a leader in an effort to realize common goals of just prosperity. If it fails to uphold a substantial democracy in everyday political life, then it does not only mean the castration of people's sovereignty or the failure of democracy alone, but the destruction of the Republic of Indonesia will be at stake.

Manifesto of the Alliance for Human Rights in China

1979 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 3-6
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Capital Punishment ◽  
General Belief ◽  
Public Meetings ◽  
The People ◽  
A Charge ◽  
The Masses ◽  
High Level ◽  
Contradictions Among The People

The repression of dissent and the arrest of a number of human rights activists in Peking last April was not unexpected. For one thing, this repression has confirmed the general belief that the authorities in China have no time for legality in any Western sense of the word. The idea that a citizen should be entitled to civil rights, held independently from the Communist Party and the State, is nearly always dismissed as a bourgeois absurdity. The Catch-22 logic of Mao's concept of the ‘contradictions among the people’ was manifested once again: the people do have a right to speak out freely, should fully air their views, hold serious debate on national issues, and write dazibaos (wall posters). But if they go too far, if they abuse that right, they are no longer allowed to exercise it. They become ‘reactionaries’. The ‘movement for democratic freedoms and respect for human rights’ started in mid-November 1978 and lasted until April of this year, becoming known as the ‘Peking Spring’. As part of their campaign, the activists held public meetings and organised demonstrations in the streets of Peking, as well as in the provinces. Dazibaos were put up on the Democracy Wall at Xidan Square in the centre of Peking. Unofficial publications were sold in the streets. Among the various publications to emerge from the movement were: The Fifth April Tribune, Today, Bulletin of References for the Masses, Tribune of the People, The Alliance for Human Rights, and Tansuo (‘Explorations’). Among the unknown number of those arrested were two well-known leaders of the movement: Wei Jingsheng, 29, electrician, publisher and editor of Tansuo. He is also the author of ‘The Fifth Modernisation’ and ‘Qin Cheng No. 1’, which describes a prison for high-level cadres in the suburb of Peking. Also detained is Ren Wanding, 35, a worker, and one of the leaders of the Alliance for Human Rights in China. Both men have been condemned by the authorities as ‘counter-revolutionaries’, a charge that carries capital punishment.

scholarly journals Research on innovation of Rural grassroots Governance driven by New Township talents from the perspective of “Internet +

2020 ◽  
Vol 189 ◽  
pp. 01021
Author(s):  
Meng Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Rural Areas ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Research Problem ◽  
Practical Result ◽  
Grass Roots ◽  
Social Governance ◽  
The People ◽  
Rural Revitalization ◽  
New Countryside ◽  
The Masses

“Internet +” is a further practical result of Internet thinking, which promotes the continuous evolution of economic forms, thus driving the vitality of social and economic entities and providing a broad network platform for reform, innovation and development. At the same time, the role of the new townsfolk in the construction of the new countryside includes the governance of the rural grass-roots level, which gradually attracts extensive attention from all walks of life. Aims to explore the prevention and get rid of rural grassroots governance crisis, the sustainable way to maintain close ties with the masses, for the revitalization of the construction of rural areas, to guide the new follow villager boost rural grass-roots governance, because new follow villager unique localism and moral superiority, this system research problem related to new follow villager and rural grassroots governance is needed urgently. Social governance at the rural grass-roots level is the social foundation for rural revitalization. Without effective social governance at the grass-roots level, the strategy of rural revitalization will not be fully realized.”Internet + Governance” is the only way to realize the modernization of grassroots governance. It is also a stepping stone for grassroots governments to use technological means to closely integrate democratic governance with the well-being of the people. It not only realizes the people-oriented care of people, but also reflects the governing principle of the rule of law.

scholarly journals GAFATAR DAN DINAMIKA GERAKAN SOSIALNYA

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 61
Author(s):  
Enkin Asrawijaya
Keyword(s):  
Political Opportunity ◽  
Government Programs ◽  
Reform Era ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Opportunities ◽  
The People ◽  
Self Sufficiency ◽  
Current Reform ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Masses

Gafatar is a form of community upheaval in Indonesia in the current reform era. Issues surrounding the ideology and the attempts of treason case became the problem that caused Gafatar to lose the masses of the public. Gafatar has the concept of food self-sufficiency which is then implemented in a peasant movement as its criticism of the government. To explain the dynamics of the Gafatar social movement, used the theory of McAdam et al, about Political Opportunities, Mobilizing Structures, and Cultural Framings. The political opportunity arises from the distrust of government programs that have been offered to the people who are deemed to be ineffective. Mobilizing Structur Gafatar movement is manifested through the formation of the organization, forming a network of cooperation and collective action. While cultural framing, created through the issues addressed to Gafatar causing the formation of negative stigma in society.

Serge Moscovici's "Réflexions sur la popularité des conspiracy mentalities"

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olivier Klein
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Social Representation ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Conspiracy Theories ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
The People ◽  
Social Representation Theory ◽  
The Masses

This is a pdf of the original typed manuscript of a lecture made in 2006. An annotated English translation will be published by the International Review of Social Psychology. I this text, Moscovici seeks to update his earlier work on the “conspiracy mentality” (1987) by considering the relationships between social representations and conspiracy mentality. Innovation in this field, Moscovici argues, will require a much thorough description and understanding of what conspiracy theories are, what rhetoric they use and what functions they fulfill. Specifically, Moscovici considers conspiracies as a form of counterfactual history implying a more desirable world (in which the conspiracy did not take place) and suggests that social representation theory should tackle this phenomenon. He explicitly links conspiracy theories to works of fiction and suggests that common principles might explain their popularity. Historically, he argues, conspiracism was born twice: First, in the middle ages, when their primary function was to exclude and destroy what was considered as heresy; and second, after the French revolution, to delegitimize the Enlightenment, which was attributed to a small coterie of reactionaries rather than to the will of the people. Moscovici then considers four aspects (“thematas”) of conspiracy mentality: 1/ the prohibition of knowledge; 2/ the duality between the majority (the masses, prohibited to know) and “enlightened” minorities; 3/ the search for a common origin, a “ur phenomenon” that connects historical events and provides a continuity to History (he notes that such a tendency is also present in social psychological theorizing); and 4/ the valorization of tradition as a bulwark against modernity. Some of Moscovici’s insights in this talk have since been borne out by contemporary research on the psychology of conspiracy theories, but many others still remain fascinating potential avenues for future research.

(Anamnesis) Revolting Bodies: “Le Forgeron” and the Poetry of the Past

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert St. Clair
Keyword(s):  
Victor Hugo ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
Political Struggles ◽  
Louis Xvi

weChapter 4 takes up the question of poetry and engagement at its most explicit and complex in Rimbaud, focusing on a long, historical epic entitled “Le Forgeron.” We read this poem, which recreates and re-imagines a confrontation between the People in revolt and Louis XVI in the summer of 1792, as Rimbaud’s attempt to add a revolutionary supplement to the counter-epics modeled by Victor Hugo in Châtiments. Chapter 4 shows how Rimbaud’s “Forgeron” challenges us to examine the ways in which a poem might seek “to enjamb” the caesura between poiesis and praxis by including and complicating revolutionary (counter)history into its folds in order to implicate itself in the political struggles of its time.

Depoliticisation, hybridisation and dual processes of stigmatisation: An examination of the civilising offensive in China’s rural areas through moral review councils

2021 ◽  
pp. 003802612110294
Author(s):  
Shaoying Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Dual Processes ◽  
Reform Era ◽  
Institutional Legitimacy ◽  
The People ◽  
Democratic Election

In this article, I examine the moral review councils (MRCs) established in China’s rural areas since the early 1980s. I show that MRCs create a liminal plebeian public sphere in the context of a civilising offensive that deals with the uncivil behaviours of individuals and disputes between neighbours. In this plebeian public sphere, the MRC incorporates techniques of the Maoist mass meeting, the democratic election, traditional mediation and a pedagogy of exemplars, all of which are depoliticised into purely technical instruments. Their institutional legitimacy comes from organised virtues based on councillors’ male seniority and the democratic method of their selection. MRCs, as an instrument of a civilising offensive, are a kind of paternalistic technology, which involves a complex strategy of a hybridity of acts, relationships, thoughts, desires and temptations of village residents in the context of the reform era. The people targeted in this civilising offensive often experience two levels of stigmatisation and their participation determines the effectiveness of the operation of MRCs.

From ‘Leading the Masses’ to ‘Serving the Consumers’? Newspaper Reporting in Contemporary Urban China

10.1068/a3563 ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 34 (9) ◽  
pp. 1635-1660 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher J Smith
Keyword(s):  
Economic Reforms ◽  
Urban China ◽  
Political Information ◽  
Daily News ◽  
Daily Newspapers ◽  
Newspaper Reporting ◽  
Study Support ◽  
The Masses ◽  
Communications System ◽  
Party State

This paper examines and evaluates the content of news items reported in a sample of daily newspapers in China's biggest cities. Using three ‘Western’ media sources, an inventory of news items directly or indirectly related to the ‘downside’ of the economic reforms was generated. A simultaneous analysis of mainland newspapers finds that many of the same themes were reported, although the coverage tends to be thinner and less detailed. Some China scholars have suggested that the Party/state is losing control of the communications system in contemporary China, and the results of this study support such arguments; city-level newspapers are now publishing what is most interesting to their consumers and likely to win them a larger share of the market. The regime still manages the dissemination of sensitive political information, but the parallel dictates of commercialization result in the disorderly and unpredictable circulation of communications messages. Mainland newspapers still steer clear of stories considered too politically ‘sensitive’, but the margins of acceptability have been expanded to include news items that only a few years ago would have been excised. The state maintains control over what is included in the daily news as well as what is excluded, although it is unclear to what extent publishing decisions result from a process of state cooptation and self-censorship, as opposed to specific directives from Beijing.

Natural Law Republicanism

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael C. Hawley
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
John Locke ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Political Legitimacy ◽  
John Adams ◽  
Political Ideas ◽  
The People ◽  
Hugo Grotius ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Individual

By any metric, Cicero’s works are some of the most widely read in the history of Western thought. This book suggests that perhaps Cicero’s most lasting and significant contribution to philosophy lies in helping to inspire the development of liberalism. Individual rights, the protection of private property, and political legitimacy based on the consent of the governed are often taken to be among early modern liberalism’s unique innovations and part of its rebellion against classical thought. However, this book demonstrates that Cicero’s thought played a central role in shaping and inspiring the liberal republican project. Cicero argued that liberty for individuals could arise only in a res publica in which the claims of the people to be sovereign were somehow united with a commitment to universal moral law, which limits what the people can rightfully do. Figures such as Hugo Grotius, John Locke, and John Adams sought to work through the tensions in Cicero’s vision, laying the groundwork for a theory of politics in which the freedom of the individual and the people’s collective right to rule were mediated by natural law. This book traces the development of this intellectual tradition from Cicero’s original articulation through the American founding. It concludes by exploring how modern political ideas remain dependent on the conception of just politics first elaborated by Rome’s great philosopher-statesman.

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