"CHINA has blocked all media on Tibet. Come hear the other side of the story", read the bright orange flyers stapled on the walls around Cabell Hall last week. Perhaps the organization missed the release of a strong petition from Chinese intellectuals demanding negotiations with the Dalai Lama. Or the fact that, for the first time, China aired a BBC interview with the Dalai Lama in full.
It is very rare that my politics classes end without a negative student comment about China, whether it be its "neo-mercantilist economy" or the "genocide-backers in Beijing." This uninformed 'China-bashing' has spread like wildfire since the riots in Tibet and as the Olympic Games approach. Meanwhile, world leaders are talking about how China should talk to the Dalai Lama. The ignorance is becoming harder to ignore, and it's time to formulate an actual strategy for resolving the Tibet question.
First, in terms of independence, all countries, including the United States, consider Tibet to be part of China. Even the Dalai Lama shelved independence as a goal in the late 1980's. Besides, Tibet has been part of China to varying degrees for over 800 years. Thus, independence is not the issue.
Second, China's occupation of Tibet was not always brutal or even heavy handed. Chairman Mao Zedong told his generals to 'go slow' in their "peaceful liberation" of Tibet in 1950, and it was only after the Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959 amidst riots that China began clamping down. Even as religious controls were enacted, economic development improved life expectancy and education levels drastically, and continue to do so.
Third, both sides deserve blame for the failure of negotiations in the past decades. When China invited the Dalai Lama to Beijing in 1989 for informal discussions, hard-line officials in Dharamsala told him not to go because increased international support did not require compromise. Similarly, China in the 1990's was unable to come up with a coherent negotiations policy because of the prevalence of more hard-line opinions.
Any approach to resolving the Tibet situation should thus note the role of hard-liners and moderates within the two sides, the agreement over Tibet's status as a part of China, and the more mixed record of China's governance.
But why should China and the Dalai Lama negotiate anyway? First, both sides must realize there are worse alternatives to deal with in the hard-line camp. Second, China's pragmatism on the Tibet issue would increase its international image as a responsible great power. Third, China and the Dalai Lama must understand that time is not on their side. The Dalai Lama is 72, and he is not getting any younger. And the massive vacuum created after his death in terms of authority and prestige would take a long time and a great effort to fill, which risks the Tibet movement fragmenting into a possible insurgency. And fourth, the Dalai Lama must realize that a compromise must come sooner rather than later as the longer the wait, the greater the chance for damaging Tibetan culture.
What should the shape of any negotiation be? No one knows for sure, but there are some major issues that need to be negotiated and compromised on. First, the Dalai Lama's demand for ethnographic Tibet -- which includes some provinces in China in addition to Tibet itself -- must be withdrawn because it constitutes 25 percent of China's territory and is simply a negotiation non-starter. Yes, it will be painful to separate the two, but if anyone can do it, it is the Dalai Lama. Also, while it is impossible to specify the exact degree of autonomy, the demand for Hong-Kong style autonomy by Dharamsala is unrealistic because Hong Kong had to be incorporated into China in the mid-1990's, while Tibet has always been a part of China. It is thus impractical to fit the "one country, two systems" model into Tibet.
On the Chinese side, extraordinarily rapid development in Tibet must be slowed down to take into account the social problems of such development. China has already begun rural health care and education programs for farmers, but more needs to be done to narrow the education and employment gap between Han Chinese settlers and ethnic Tibetans. While the settlement of Han Chinese is an urgent problem that needs to be tackled, to China's credit, the Han population in Tibet has actually declined since 1982, contrary to popular belief. The fact that the Chinese Communist Party has adopted "Scientific Development" as its development mantra with a focus on creating a harmonious society through economic development bodes well for pragmatism in this area. Religious and cultural issues, such as the freeing up of monasteries, should also be addressed once greater confidence building is facilitated within the negotiation process.
Tibet is a complex issue often subjected to over-simplistic analysis. Boycotting the Olympic Games only excludes Beijing out of the international community at a time where it is growing more entrenched into the global norms of multilateral institutions. It will also trigger a nationalist, anti-Western backlash. What is truly needed is a bold effort designed to negotiate an end to this bitter dispute. Only then can the Tibetan snow lion and Chinese dragon co-exist in peace.
Prashanth Parameswaran's column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at pparameswaran@cavalierdaily.com.
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