National Identity and Democratic Prospects in Socialist China (review)

Reviews 415 Edward Friedman. National Identity and Democratic Prospects in Socialist China. Armonk and London: M. E. Sharpe, 1995. xii, 359 pp. Hardcover $55.00, isbn 1-56324-433-0. Paperback $19.95, 1SBN 1-56324-434-9. Observers ofChina are now pondering whether this huge nation, the largest in the world by population, will retain its unity and perhaps dominate world politics in a few years, or suffer the consequences ofuncontrollable centrifugal tendencies and break into pieces, rendering it weak and incapable ofmuch influence over the course ofworld events, except possibly to cause problems as the result of civil war or conflict and the resulting flood ofrefugees. The answer to this question lies in considerable part in the ability of China's leaders to promote a national identity and make the transition from dictatorship to democracy. One must assume, of course, that the egalitarianism, self-reliance, anti-imperialism, and isolationism of Maoism are now extinct and will not return to influence the process. Edward Friedman has been thinking and writing about the issues ofnationalism , national identity, and democracy, since 1987. National Identity and Democratic Prospects in Socialist China, a collection ofhis essays on these topics, is the result ofhis work. Friedman's main assumption is that, in contrast to the structuralist view that an answer to the question ofwhether China can become a democracy (answered by most in the negative) is rooted in its distant past and is already predetermined, China is capable ofdemocracy. He argues that several Asian countries have in fact proved tiiat Asian countries can become democratic. Taiwan has proven that a Chinese country can. In his Introduction, Friedman observes that China seems like two different countries when one visits both northern and southern China. The north is autocratic ; the south is more democratic and progressive. Ethos is not in the Chinese vocabulary. These facts and the presence ofindependence movements in Tibet and Xinjiang and the "de facto independence" of Guangdong call into question whether China has a truly national identity. The author also notes that the 1980s witnessed a change ofperception in China, recalling the Tang dynasty, when foreign commerce flourished, when Buddhism came to China from abroad, and when die political system was decentralized. Thus, the anti-imperialist glue is gone, and there are prospects for a new, open, national identity, without which the prospects for democracy are not good.© 1996 by UniversityIn the six chapters ofpart 2, Friedman discusses China's national identity criofHawai 'i Presssjs jiere ^6 author notes that, faced bywhat appears to be the fading ofa country with a long and continuous history, by an increase in the number ofminorities because oftheir "coming out," and by the failure of a Leninist system that 416 China Review International: Vol. 3, No. 2, Fall 1996 created a "fantastic inequality" (p. 46), Chinese leaders (in Beijing—in the north, it should be noted) have revived Confucianism to justify dictatorship. Friedman observes that Mao's anti-imperialist nationalism failed, and Leninism (upon which Mao nominally based his rule of China) is now viewed as having brought to China, instead ofprogress, an unnecessary call to political revolution. However , he notes that the "Leninist cadaver" is still around (p. 74). Friedman says that the Chinese leadership (again meaning Beijing) has encouraged ethnic violence elsewhere in the world to instill fear among the population while attributing China's economic development to the spread of Confucianism in China. The reason for this approach is a fear that China may be on the verge of a split between north and south—with the south perceiving that recent economic progress has been made possible by the breakdown of central political control and by China's opening up to the outside world and foreign capital. Friedman underscores the north-south differences by pointing to the modern and democratic culture of the south that stands against the autocratic, reactionary north. Some readers will differ with this view, as will officials in China—understandably —but Friedman effectively defends his position. Part 3 is tided "After Socialist Anti-Imperialism." Here Friedman examines China's hopes for democracy, noting both impediments (cultural, the legacies of Leninism, etc.) and resistance on the part of Chinese leaders...